


Lissom Locum

by melonbug



Series: Lissom Locum [1]
Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Alchemy, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Assassination Plot(s), Avatar Toph Beifong, Azula (Avatar)-centric, Bending (Avatar), Conspiracy, F/F, Fire Nation Politics (Avatar), Firelord Iroh (Avatar), Gen, Herbalism, Past Child Abuse, Politics, Prophecies, Spirits, Worldbuilding
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-24
Updated: 2021-02-22
Packaged: 2021-03-07 00:08:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 48,133
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26087689
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/melonbug/pseuds/melonbug
Summary: Locum, noun: a person who fulfills the position of another.Toph had memories that were not her own and she knew: Avatars died, and they died at the hands of the Fire Nation. And she was now headed there willingly, with the full intent of learning firebending from the Crown Prince himself.The war was over and the world was different now, but there would always be conflict. And conflict was waiting for her in the Fire Nation.An Avatar!Toph AU.
Relationships: Azula/Mai (Avatar), Toph Beifong & Zuko
Series: Lissom Locum [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/372770
Comments: 45
Kudos: 109





	1. Warm Welcome

**Author's Note:**

> This story has been kicking around for a very long time. With a potential resurgence of the franchise and more accessibility to the show than ever, I thought it a great time to reboot this story I began nearly a decade ago, when the show was just ending. So if this story looks familiar, that may be why :)
> 
> To break down the timeline, the characters here are roughly 18/20/21 (Toph, Azula, Zuko) but obviously there's wiggle room to that.

If it weren’t the most efficient means of getting from point A to point B—point A being Gaoling and point B being the capital city of the Fire Nation—Toph decided that she would never, ever set foot on any kind of seafaring vessel again, be it ship or boat or canoe. As it was, though, she was currently standing on the deck of a Fire Nation ship bound for the Royal Palace.

From where she stood, with the warm metal coarse and rough against her bare feet, her sight radiated outwards from stern to bow. She singled out the distant heartbeat of a lone crew member who was still awake, moving about the ship’s upper cabin, and his footsteps echoed through the metal, sending vibrations up through her feet and throbbing through her ears as if she could actually hear him, as far away as he was.

The comfort of that sight, out in the middle of the ocean, had done little to make the journey any more bearable, however. For seven long days the rocking of the boat had made her stomach queasy and the stench of saltwater had stung her nostrils and only furthered her nausea. The constant sounds—from the steady thrum of the engine room, vibrating through the many levels of the ship and  _ into _ her, like so many pins and needles jolting against her legs; to the sound of the ocean, powerful and strong and spraying it’s mist against the ship’s bow—had set her head to throbbing on a far too regular basis.

She missed being  _ grounded _ . She missed earthbending and longed for it all the more on the days when the firebending members of the crew performed their drills and she sat atop the ship’s cabin and listened to them, reveling in the warmth and the energy they exuded as they moved, a beautifully choreographed formation.

Their heat was now noticeably absent and in its place was the clammy coolness of the night; as they'd grown closer to the Fire Nation the air had become heavy and damp. In the day, under the beams of the sun and with the breeze of the ocean, it was almost bearable. But the nights were met with goosebumps and the sluggish weight of the ocean air hanging about the ship.

It was at night, though, that Toph could wander the deck alone, and it was her restless sleep that found her spending her time above deck so late into the evening, long after the majority of the crew had finally retired.

She closed her eyes and drew a deep breath of ocean air and held it, counting slowly to ten— _ eight, nine, ten _ —then released, feeling her rib cage loosen on the exhale. She widened her stance, imagined the firebenders in her mind, the subtle variations in their movements, and attempted to feel something, anything, within her resembling warmth. The movements were certain and fluid, a bit like dancing, she thought, and she followed them, thrust a fist forward and—

Nothing.

She couldn’t firebend. She couldn’t waterbend or airbend, either—not properly anyway—but at least the water rippled at her touch and the air stirred against her fingers. There was a connection there that she couldn’t yet feel with the heat of a fire. If she focused hard enough and sought out the impurities within the metal, reducing it to it’s true form, a product of earth, she could feel the smooth plating of the ship’s deck warp beneath her feet. She could metalbend _ ,  _ but the fire wasn’t there.

She huffed and stepped her way across the deck, aware of eyes following her, a presence whose heartbeat—careful, slow, controlled—had only barely given her away. Toph’s guard had noticed her absence and now, hidden away in the shadows of the ship’s upper cabin, the woman watched her, no doubt aware that Toph knew she was there. It stirred unease within her that wasn’t just the result of the endless pitching of the ship. She detested the presence of a guard, especially of someone who was supposed to be an elite guard of the King himself. 

She was blind, not stupid, and she knew that the woman tucked into the shadows was not merely a guard of the King but also an agent of the Dai Li; and Toph also knew that, disguised among the small handful of Earth Kingdom soldiers accompanying the five representatives of the King journeying with her—albeit for different, far more politicized reasons—was a second Dai Li.

Many fingers in many pies, and she strongly wished she could have absolutely nothing to do with it.

If she’d had her way, she would have made the trip alone, but never had she had such luck. The Earth King was powerful and rich and her father, too, was powerful and rich. Protection was just an excuse, as weak as it was, for both of them to have constant eyes on her.

Still, though, she had memories, vague and distant, that were not her own and she knew. Avatars died, and they died at the hands of the Fire Nation, and she was headed, willingly, into the hands of those whose line had personally seen to the deaths of the prior Avatars.

She tried not to think too hard about the fact that a firebending Avatar was next in line and how easy it would be for the Fire Nation to finally have the pawn they’d always wanted if she were to die. It’d be another fifteen, twenty years, but that would be nothing compared to the hundred years they’d spent hunting the other Avatars just to get to her.

All of her father’s money couldn’t protect her from that and all of the Earth King’s army couldn’t save her. If she couldn’t protect herself from the Fire Nation, a hundred men weaker than herself could do no better.

It was a political game that they had dragged her into against her wishes. She didn’t care about influence or representing military might. She didn’t care what the Earth Kingdom had to prove, she cared only about what she had to prove. The Fire Nation had a shaky treaty with the Earth Kingdom, and they wouldn’t harm her, not with so much at stake. There was no reason for them to invite her here only to kill her and start another war. They had only just finished a hundred years of war and they were only all the more weak for it.

Everyone was.

Morning was coming and, with it, land would soon be in sight on the horizon. She’d once run her fingers across a topographical map of the world and she could still remember the contours of the Fire Nation—sharp, rough peaks jutting here and there across a crescent of land that spiraled outward across the ocean; a landscape defined by the violent cataclysms of ten thousand years of volcanic activity. It was a view she would never see, but she would still feel the earth on which it was built.

Morning would come and she would have to shed the messy routine she’d fallen into during the journey; her attendant would wrangle her hair into something fitting her status and she would be forced back into the role she’d been born into. Then, hopefully, Toph would step safely onto Fire Nation soil, where she would spend the next few months learning firebending.

* * *

The Avatar was, despite her slight five foot two, tall in her regality, with a posture born of years of tolerance of the manners and etiquette befitting and expected of those of a noble class—Zuko recognized it because it was the same strict upbringing he himself had experienced. She strode from the ship as if the very land beneath her were hers—walking like an earthbender—head held high and shoulders drawn up, defining both the lovely drape of her rather simple dress, made of the finest Earth Kingdom silks of appropriate colors and, beneath it, the barest hint of a muscular body. Her hair, though pulled high in an elaborate bun, was askew and loose about her face such that only the slender, rounded slant of her jaw stood easily visible from across the Plaza.

She was flanked by two women—one scarcely as tall as her—who walked just behind her with a trepidation that stood in sharp contrast to the way the Avatar held herself. Behind her, trickling down the ramp from the ship, were a number of additional Earth Kingdom officials arriving with her for yet another round of peace talks between their kingdom and the Fire Nation, and among them, a smattering of well placed Earth Kingdom soldiers.

Zuko’s eyes, though, were fixed on the Avatar.

The first Avatar in over a hundred years to set foot on Fire Nation soil and she strode onto it as though there were nothing to fear, as if Avatars didn’t typically come to the Fire Nation to die.

Zuko straightened where he stood and drew his shoulders high, fighting against the weight of his formal robes. His hair, pulled up too tight and equally as formal as his dress, was bringing about a headache and he closed his eyes for a long moment, forcing it away. It was early in the morning, but already the air had begun to bake with the heat of the rising sun, amplified by it’s reflection on the water.

His mother, to his right, broke briskly from their position near the base of the Plaza stairs and made her way to the entourage approaching. All of this has been her—the planning, the Avatar’s arrival, the latest round of peace talks—all of it. She was a diplomat, first, with a regal, powerful presence, and a lady, second, composed and polite.

Beside him his sister fell in line with her.

Azula was a hawkish presence dressed in her formal armor, all reds and blacks against his and their mother’s reds and golds. A military might beside political affluence. It was surprisingly fitting and an appropriate enough presentation for the welcoming of the Avatar.

Finally, she reached them and gave a small bow, loose strands of hair falling from her hurried bun, her hands neatly forming the sign of Agni. And at last, as she lifted her head to them, Zuko caught sight of her face in full and the vacant eyes that looked back at them.

She was blind.

The sight of her so close up sucked the breath from him and he knew his startle was visible, though at least not to the Avatar, who it seemed could not see him. Beside him, Azula murmured under her breath a harsh whisper of words Zuko couldn't quite make out.

Ursa swept forward, unphased and open, bowing in return. “Welcome to the Fire Nation, Avatar Beifong,” she said, and the Avatar grinned back.

* * *

Only the briefest introductions were made before they were swept away to the palace. He made the ride back with Azula, his mother with the Avatar and her attendants, and her entourage close behind in their own carriages. His sister was silent most of the way, but she watched him closely, shoulders tense. The buzz of the Avatar’s arrival had bore them no shortage of stress, Azula in particular. And then there was the timing, his uncle so recently having fallen ill.

The silence drilled into him and her gaze set him more so on edge. She was too much their mother, in all the ways that were scariest and most intimidating, and he grit his teeth against her quiet stare.

“Mai will be there tonight,” he said when at last he thought the silence would swallow him, “At the party.” There would be a celebration that night to welcome their guests, and it would be another shallow, performative gesture, saturated and dripping with the tense political discourse surrounding any interaction between the two nations. Neither Zuko or Azula were looking forward to it, especially given the fanfare of the Avatar’s arrival and the absence of the Fire Lord, which that night they would have to begin addressing.

_ Carry on as usual. _

Azula gave him only a vague look and nodded, finally,  _ finally _ looking away, turning her gaze instead to the window of their carriage. “Can you train a blind girl?” she asked after another moment had passed. Her biting tongue easily replaced her eyes on him.

He shifted in his seat, awkward and hot in his stifling robes. “I said I would train her,” he said softly. “That was the arrangement.”

Across from him, Azula scoffed, eager as always to express her opinion; but she held her tongue this time to Zuko’s surprise, choosing to instead return to looking dully at the scenery outside of their carriage, which with every passing moment was becoming rockier as they departed Harbor City and began their ascent to the capital proper where it sat tucked away in the crater at the peak of the mountain; the ride grew bumpier as they rolled across dislodged cobblestones and old, cracked stretches of rocky earth. The creak of the wheels beneath them and the occasional groan from the beasts hauling their carriage filled the silence for the duration of their trip, as Azula had decided she was done speaking.

* * *

Introductions had been nearly overwhelming, too many names and nothing but heartbeats and sounds to attach to them. But missing among everyone Toph had met had been, to her huge disappointment, the Fire Lord, who she had been told was ill and confined to bed rest. Lady Ursa had been an intimidating presence, but her demeanor had been welcoming and kind and at every stressful moment she had stuck closely by her side to put her more at ease.

By the time Toph finally found herself alone it was well past midday and the exhaustion of the morning, and the seven prior days, clung to her eyes and her limbs and seeped deep into her muscles, which were cramped from nights of tossing and turning.

Her room was in the eastern wing of the Royal Palace, tucked into the corner where two long, sweeping hallways met. Her attendant, Jin, and her guard, Lian, were housed in the room adjacent to hers for the duration of their stay; they would be leaving with the rest of the entourage from the Earth Kingdom at week’s end, and until then she would have to endure their presence one room over. Though her senses were dulled within the walls of the palace, Toph could still make out the faint heartbeats of the women nearby. 

She wiggled her bare toes against the smooth slate tile beneath her feet, familiarizing herself with her new room: the giant bed, the adjourning bath chamber, the large wardrobe within which Jin had already neatly tucked her belongings. For all of the summer this would be her temporary home, nearly half a world away from where she’d come to be so many years earlier; she wouldn’t miss Ba Sing Sei any more than she missed Gao Ling.

Her new bed was a strong upgrade from the one on the ship—the cot had been thin, the scratchy blankets always either too hot or too cold—though not much more so than the one she had in her room in the palace at Ba Sing Sei: thick blankets, a lush soft mattress, pillows upon pillows, a sweeping curtain hung around it, pulled back with ribbons.

Sleep took her almost the moment she settled her head amongst the pillows, her eyes too heavy to hold open, and she slept a deep sleep until the moment when at last a knock at her door woke her, signalling what could only be the arrival of her attendant, ready to help her prepare for the night’s celebration. Toph called for her to enter and, with a deep groan, dragged herself from the comfort of the bed.

Jin was on the surface a soft-spoken woman, not much older than Toph, who was bubbly and prone to snorting when she laughed—a trait she was neither ignorant or embarrassed of. There was an air about her that contrasted sharply with the stuffy energy of the Earth King’s palace, and so when her mother—and of course, the King—had insisted an attendant accompany her, she had chosen Jin from the half dozen or so palace attendants she interacted with on a daily basis.

Toph’s feet met the ground just as the door opened. Jin was far more refreshed than she was, and the woman swept in with a lively greeting, beelining for the large bathroom that adjoined her room. Toph followed the sound of rushing water as Jin began to fill the grand tub within. Her bath was large and she was pleased to find the water that poured from the spigot was almost hot, and the barest hint of steam began to cling to the air at the rise in temperature. Her skin was rough and dry from so many days at sea, and her hair was a mess barely held together with pins.

Jin was quick to help her disrobe and for the sake of being polite, Toph allowed her assistance. 

"How long do I have?"

She had moved across the room in the time it had taken Toph to settle comfortably into the water. The large tub was copper and the woman's heartbeat was muddled through the soft material and the movement of the water, but Toph could still feel her presence and she could feel the moment the woman stopped what she was doing to answer her. 

"A few hours," she supplied, returning to Toph's side. A strong floral scent filled the room, and the water, where it bubbled near the spigot pouring at her feet, became slick in a way that told Toph she had added soap to the bath. She wiggled her toes in it, reveling in the interesting feeling. “This will likely take a while.”

It took Toph a moment too long to realize Jin was being cheeky with her, and she had to wave off the woman’s sudden stuttering apology as she finally burst out into laughter at her boldness. Jin did not seem entirely shy, but, in the time Toph had traveled with her, she had found her to be reserved, though excited for the trip.

Regardless, Jin was right—her few baths at sea had been brief and the ocean air had been unforgiving to her skin and hair; a few hours scarcely seemed enough preparation for the evening ahead, and her bit of laughter was short lived as Jin finally set about unpinning her hair and sorting through the nest gathered about her head. It took two thorough washes and, once Jin had poured the last jug of water over her head and rid it of the last of the soap, she gently combed through her hair, humming softly.

"Your hair is beautiful, Toph," she said after a moment. "I'm so jealous."

Toph blushed and murmured out a  _ thank you  _ as she finally climbed from the water, Jin handing a towel to her so she could dry herself. Idly, she wondered what Jin’s hair was like; was it dark? Coarse? Long or short? Toph could barely articulate what her own hair looked like beyond the texture of it when she ran it through her fingers, but her attendant combed it and called it beautiful, as if her hair were somehow far different than her own.

While Toph changed into her underclothes, Jin set about digging through her wardrobe, and by the time she stepped in from the bathroom the other woman was laying her clothing for the evening across the now tidily made up bed.

The moment Toph’s hand brushed across the fabric she knew what it was Jin had selected for her to wear to the evening’s party: it was a dress—a hanbok—her mother had made for her and had sent along as a parting gift on her journey.

Toph ran her fingers along the tight embroidery decorating the heavy panels of silk making up the long skirt of the garment; the attention to detail was not missed even by her; she could feel the individual pieces of floss and their varying textures and densities and understand the beauty held in it. She did not need to ask Jin of the colors, because she knew they were in the greens of the Earth Kingdom, in the pastel shades of the southern territories where her family lived. In her lifetime she had worn many dresses, almost all of them heavy and itchy and hot, and in not one of them had she ever felt like herself.

The work put into the garment was not at all lost on Toph, who had grown up by her mother's knee, absorbing the motion of her body as she embroidered; the push-pull of the needle through fabric was a movement she experienced only vicariously through her mother. Had she not been born blind, she would have been lessoned in the craft herself, as ladies of her status were supposed to be.

Jin crowed about the dress, coming up suddenly beside Toph and brushing a hand across the material as well. “They’re lotus blossoms,” she said, and Toph nodded as if she understood what a lotus blossom looked like. As a child she had been fond of them; in the vaguest of her memories was the smell of them and the feel of their petals beneath her tiny fingers and the moisture held in them, which stuck to her hands when she plucked them from their homes in the pond on her parents property. They’d filled the pond in when she was maybe seven or eight, and now the petals of those flowers felt like a distant memory barely held together by the delicate embroidery her mother had woven across silk.

* * *

The party was exactly as dull as Zuko had expected. The disdainful politics of the evening kept him moving from person to person, all of them vapid and toady. They smiled and showered him in pretty words to get themselves into his good graces, and he made sure to remember least fondly those who sucked up to him the most.

But it was a necessity he would have to suffer through; he was the Crown Prince and the next Fire Lord, as no one ceased to remind him. Every greeting was accompanied by questions:  _ When is your inauguration? When is Fire Lord Iroh abdicating? _

Zuko didn’t know any more than they did, and he was in far less of a hurry to find out. At times he thought he would rather never become the Fire Lord, but it was his destiny and his place in life.

Hanging amongst all of it—the pressure, the stress, the questions—was the troubling truth.  _ Carry on as normal,  _ was his resounding mantra when conversations inevitably led to  _ Where is the Fire Lord? _

Across the room his sister made better work of the crowd, all small smiles and curt nods. He made his way over to her, eyes peeled for their mother, who had yet to turn up with the Avatar. The Earth Kingdom officials would be arriving with her, although he spotted several of their soldiers mingling with the imperial guards scattered about.

“Zuko,” Azula said when she saw him, breezing past several people attempting to talk with her. “I was just looking for you.” She smiled too wide and linked her arm through his, pulling him alongside her. The facade dropped the moment she was out of earshot and she made a sour face at him. 

“This is horrendous.” she murmured, rolling her eyes, as petulant as before. Gone was her armor from that morning and in its place were the elaborate layered robes of her formal kimono, in the same colors as his own robes, marking their status. Her hair had been swept up into her royal hairpiece with a few stray locks left out to frame her face, and her make up featured sweeping brushes of sparkling gold pigment across her lids. The downturn of her deep red lips and the shadows cast by the low lighting of the evening sun across her face was unnerving. Even dressed in such contrast to her everyday appearance, she was a beautiful terror to look upon.

“Azula,” a voice called from behind them, low and soft and carrying the hint of a chuckle. They turned to see Mai approaching and, if Zuko thought it at all possible for his sister to brighten up, he would say she did so at seeing the other woman at last. Mai, despite her own dark demeanor, seemed equally as happy to see Azula, and was clothed just as beautifully, though she dressed in the style of the North: her deep red kimono favored the color of aged plum wine, while the hakama worn over it —whose legs Zuko noticed at once were divided— was colored a deeper, more vibrant crimson . Even as a man he was educated well enough on the traditional ways of clothing to find it amusing how flagrantly Mai rejected normalization and bore it regally, demanding someone speak about the masculinity and forwardness of her garb—a trait very much learned from Azula, though the Princess fell in a line more prettily with expectations, if only to play the long con.

Zuko was quickly forgotten as Azula surged forward to meet Mai, who she had not seen in months. They clasped hands briefly in the small distance between them before breaking apart.

“How was your journey?” Azula asked, and the relief at Mai’s presence was clear in her voice, in the tension leaving her shoulders, in the way the lines of her face finally smoothed out.

“Uneventful,” Mai supplied. Her ride from the north, where her father was governor, would have been a number of days by carriage, and would have taken her through several precarious mountain paths. “We cut it quite close. We only just got in a few hours ago.”

Zuko began to edge away, to give them their privacy, but Mai suddenly turned her sharp eyes his way, stopping him short. Her darkly painted lips gave him a cheeky grin.

“Zuko,” she said pleasantly, and he nodded in acknowledgement. “Where’s the Avatar? I thought certain she’d be with you.”

He shuffled awkwardly under her steely gaze, clearing his throat. “She’ll be arriving with my mother shortly.”

He plucked a flute of wine from the platter of a passing server and made himself busy sipping at it as Azula murmured something into Mai’s ear. The alcohol soothed his nerves a bit and he sighed into the glass, letting himself relax a little.

The night was still young.

He was interrupted by the sudden quiet of the room, a silence which fell upon them all alarmingly fast. Zuko cast his eyes in line with all of those around him to see, at last, the Avatar appearing at the top of the stairs. She was adorned, as expected, in the colors of the Earth Kingdom; her dress was long on her small frame, with a large, sweeping skirt embroidered with flowers; her hair was braided and pulled up, embellished with delicate gems and gold filigree. 

Her presence at once enveloped the room, all eyes on her as she made her way down the stairway with graceful steps. Zuko saw his mother following close behind and, in her shadow so much so as to be almost unnoticed, the guard who before had been at the Avatar's side. The other Earth Kingdom diplomats trickled in behind her.

The noise level of the room rose as she reached the ballroom proper and was quickly overcome with the crowd eager to speak with her. Ursa stood with her to assuage them and ease her introductions.

Zuko made no move to join them, instead content to stand back, sip the last of his drink, and enjoy the brief respite. He was not surprised to find Azula and Mai had already disappeared.

The distinct edge of nervousness that had previously been hanging about as they all had awaited the arrival of the Avatar, was now simmering away. Reading the room, Zuko could feel it at last coming alive and beginning to buzz with the energy expected of an evening celebration rather than a droll political affair. He imagined his mother’s charm was at work, and the Avatar herself, from what little he caught of her, seemed also to be hard at work socializing. 

Their guest of honor having arrived and with his belly warm with the fizzy burn of alcohol, Zuko found it much easier to talk; questions seemed to lean less towards his future as a Fire Lord and far more to catching up on the world at large, which now very much centered around the newfound existence of the Avatar and what that meant for them all.

The massive foyer in which they were set up was framed by two large staircases on either side, the path between which led out onto a grand balcony. It was this balcony that Zuko eventually found himself on. Alcoved away as it was, he discovered it to be blissfully deserted.

It was dark out now, but otherwise was a beautiful, crystal clear night. In the distance, across a dark spread of forest, Harbor City stretched out towards the ocean, a splash of dancing lights in the dying evening.

Zuko made his way to the edge to rest his arms on the ornate iron railings that protected him from the sharp drop below. Muffled noise from the party drifted out to him and it was a soft lullaby to the backdrop of crickets chirping in the night.

He stayed there for a while, not at all missing the social niceties of the party. Eventually, though, footsteps behind him drew his attention from the view and he turned to see the Avatar approaching. She looked as tired as he felt, her shoulders now slouched from the weight of the evening. She seemed tense and he smiled only to quickly realize she couldn’t see it.

Avatar Beifong was serene in the moonlight, which cast a glow about her. She looked as small up close as she did from far away, and he found himself nervous as she approached and dropped her hands lazily over the railing. His eyes were drawn to them, for want of something to look at that wasn’t so obviously her, and he found them to be worn and calloused, with blunt nails and dry cuticles. Earthbending hands.

“Sorry to intrude,” she said, a small grin playing across her face. “But I imagine the view from here is quite lovely and it seemed a good excuse to get away for a moment.”

Zuko laughed at her comment, despite himself, and she laughed as well, an uproariously unladylike laugh. The anxiousness of being in her presence melted away and he felt as if she were far more human than she appeared to be, and than he had imagined the Avatar could be.

For a moment the two of them stood there in mutual silence, facing the sea.

“So…” Zuko began, hunting desperately for something to say as the silence grew increasingly awkward. “How are you liking the Fire Nation thus far?”

She wrinkled her nose. “Hot,” she deadpanned. Zuko looked to see that Toph had cracked a smile. “But I’ve enjoyed my time so far,” she amended in the wake of his silence and he laughed.

“I’m glad,” he said. “Unfortunately, though, summer is only just beginning.”

She sighed, blowing from her face a loose strand of hair that had come astray; up close, Zuko could see the delicate details of the hair ornaments that affixed her up-do in place: lotus petals made of gems adorned the ends of long golden combs tucked into the black curls of her hair.

“I’ll adjust,” she said suddenly, and Zuko, startled, yanked his gaze back to her face. For a moment he could almost imagine she was looking at him, but he knew it wasn’t the case. “I once spent weeks wandering the Si Wong Desert.”

“Oh. Was this a spiritual journey of some kind?” he asked, confused at her choice of words. Though Zuko had had little opportunity to travel in his life, he had studied maps and learned of the world beyond the Fire Nation. The Si Wong Desert  was always a swath of emptiness across parchment.

Her laughter, which struck her so fiercely she had to briefly turn away to compose herself, had his face beet red and he found himself all the more thankful she couldn’t see him.

“Something like that,” she replied after a moment, her breath still stuttering in her chest. “It’s a long story, one for another time.”

Zuko had little time to wonder about it, because the tail end of her words were followed by the arrival of company. The Avatar turned first at the sound of footsteps and he looked to see Mai’s father striding out, a smirk on his face that Zuko knew meant trouble; of course the man had come to pester them, so eager he had always been for approval from the royal family.

“Governor Ukano,” Zuko greeted with a nod of his head.

“Prince Zuko, Avatar Beifong!” The man gave a sharp bow, drawing to a halt some distance away to look past them at the ocean in the distance, taking a moment to linger on the view as Zuko had. His hands were clasped fast behind him, emphasizing the sweep of his robes, fashioned in the deeper reds of his province just as Mai’s were. “How lucky I am to find you both here.” He returned his gaze to them with a sinister smile.

Zuko braced himself, only the man didn’t approach. Something was off and Zuko took a careful step back, looking about for a guard and turning up nothing given their secluded spot. Even the Avatar's guard, who had been so near to her since her arrival, was conspicuously absent.

Beside him, the Avatar seemed also to be acutely aware something was not right. He could feel a shift in the air and the mood at once became tense.

Ukano lifted his eyes skyward, to the waning moon. "A shame we weren't so lucky with the Fire Lord."

"What do you know about the Fire Lord?” Zuko demanded.

Ukano laughed, and he swept his arms forward, the long folds of his robes obscuring his hands. “I know he’s a tough old fool. Mai’s poisons are particularly strong.” He took a step back, putting more distance between them. “This, though, should prove far more effective.”

Zuko’s heart hammered hard in his chest at the man’s words, but he had little time to react. When Ukano finally moved, he moved surprisingly fast for a man of his age. From the folds of his robes he revealed, clutched in his palms, what looked to be discus-shaped objects. He threw them with a gesture not at all unlike the way Mai battled, the flick of his wrists sending the items flying smoothly towards them, a sharp whistle accompanying their flight.

Zuko, so focused on them, didn’t see the Avatar move until her presence forced itself to be known to him once more. Her hand grabbed his arm, forcefully yanking him from the path of attack, which he had not moved from in his sudden decision to block and face the assault head on.

But the Avatar was not having it. She hauled him aside with little effort and Zuko broke sight of the objects long enough he almost missed exactly what happened next.

Mid-air they halted, seconds before they were close enough to do whatever their intent had been—many things had come to mind: blades could propel outwards, poison could spray from it on impact, smoke could spill forth and choke their lungs; but all of these things could have been swept aside with a properly timed burst of flame. Instead, the items in question hurtled suddenly away, into the sky.

They made it scarcely more than ten meters before they exploded violently with a force that sent both him and the Avatar, whose hand still clung tightly to his arm, stumbling backwards onto the ground. A burst of heat and ash and embers spilled across the balcony, the evening breeze sweeping it aggressively about, choking them; his ears rang loudly, all sound suddenly narrowing sharply to a painful shrilling within his head. As the dust cleared, Zuko could see that, hovering in the air all about, were scraggly shards of metal, hardly bigger than thumbnails.

Gracelessly, they fell to scatter across the broken and fractured tiles now decorating the ground. Zuko clambered to his feet, summoning flames to hands. Ukano’s voice broke the ringing in his ears, a litany of curses followed by shouts of pain. He dropped from his stance, looking to where the man now lay, curled on the cracked and shattered tiles near the large doors to the balcony. The Avatar stood above him and as Zuko approached he could see that she had disarmed the man almost immediately, though it seemed it had not taken much effort.

Toph hauled the man to his feet with ease by the collar of his robes, just as guards finally spilled out onto the balcony. He was manhandled into their waiting grasp, and it seemed to reignite his fury.

Zuko managed to catch a glimpse of them dragging him away: his face was twisted with madness, eyes flitting wildy about the room until at last they landed upon his daughter, who stood near to the growing crowd, Azula clinging to her arm. Mai looked stricken, eyes wide in terror. Ukano’s cursing died into laughter, and finally he was hauled through the doorway and out of sight.

Mai went somewhat more quietly. “I had nothing to do with this,” she cried out to Azula as she was pulled away from the princess. The woman stood silently, lips pursed, hands trembling at her sides. “I promise you, Azula. I would never—”

Her voice died in the noise of the gathering onlookers and she stopped resisting at the look of pain on Azula’s face. Their mother swept in, quickly guiding her from the room by her shoulders, her hands a vice grip against the fragility of Azula. Zuko turned from them both, and from the crowd finally being ushered away by more guards that had begun arriving.

As the chaos settled, he took a moment to assess the scene and piece together some understanding of what had happened; the wreckage, without question, spoke to the power of the explosion. It occurred to him that, had they not been intercepted—by the Avatar, he now realized, who had bent the explosives not only away but had also held back the brunt of the shrapnel—the attack very well might have killed them or otherwise maimed them greatly.

Nearby sat the Avatar, leaned against a column and looking as frazzled as Zuko himself felt. He’d already watched her aggressively refuse the aid of the palace physician, who had been one of the earliest arrivals to the scene. But if she felt anything as he did, she would probably accept some assistance soon, when things had calmed down.

Carefully, as he was still quite dizzy, he dropped down to sit next to her. With any luck that dizziness would soon subside; the physician had given him a remedy, but it had yet to take effect. He drew in a slow breath and let it out in a sigh. Beside him, the Avatar thumped her head back against the column with a groan.

“Avatar—” he began, but she cut him off with a huff.

“Please,” she insisted. “Call me Toph.”

He mustered a smile. “Alright, Toph, _ ”  _ he amended. “Thank you. You saved our lives.”

She managed to crack her own smile. “S’no problem.”

* * *

Toph slept restlessly that night. She dreamt of fire, and the thick, choking smell of smoke, a feeling now so viscerally real to her. In all of her dreams—or were they memories?—she was always blind, but in this particular dream it was the smoke that blinded and burned her eyes and sent her stumbling down a rocky path, her bloodied, bare feet slipping and making her fall. All around her was the chaos of a battle lost before it had even begun, her ears filled with screams and cries.

The  _ thump thump _ of bodies hitting the floor like sacks of flour led her to her freshly fallen brethren, amongst whom she tried to hide, hoping the soldiers might take her for dead and pass her over.

It didn’t work. Large hands seized her and hauled her up, and the ability to scream and plead for mercy was snatched from her as a scorching hot hand squeezed itself around her neck, growing hotter by the moment. “I found him, I found the Avatar!” 

Warmth suddenly flooded her, and power too—an enormous power that immediately stilled the world around her. The hand on her neck loosened and the body holding her dropped like a dead weight. Air rushed around her, roaring loudly in her ears, drowning out even the sound of her blood rushing to her head.

She could feel herself pull the air from the lungs of everyone around her, suffocating them, sending them flying. And then, abruptly, it stopped, and she stood in the middle of hundreds of bodies, alone, the world around her alarmingly quiet.

Toph woke in a cold sweat in her stifling room, her neck still burning.

* * *

The prison was dark this time of night, filled with worrisome shadows and flickering lights from the sconces on the stone walls. The guards let her through as they always did, and if they at all questioned her presence here so late at night, they raised no objections. Azula followed behind them with quick, precise steps.

All around her, peering through iron cell bars, were the sunken, angry faces of the Fire Nation’s worst—murderers and monsters—and Azula, as always, paid them no mind. They, in turn, knew better than to leer or otherwise try to grab her attention. Her reputation preceded her.

The guards stopped abruptly at an unfamiliar door, leading her through it and down another unfamiliar hallway. Cells still lined the walls, but they stood open and empty. Azula drew to a stop, narrowing her eyes, hackles raised.

“Where are you taking me?” she demanded, and the two guards turned to look at her, eyeing her warily. They wore the look of two men ready for their shifts to be done, and they did not at all appear threatening. She eased back a little.

“He’s been moved, Princess,” one of them told her and she clicked her tongue at him, still angry.

“And who authorized this?”

“The Warden.”

She stood still for another moment, cautiously taking in the empty cells around her, and then finally consented to continuing onwards. Unease curled in her gut and she swallowed it down. They walked for only a few more minutes before they rounded another corner and then there he was.

He had the whole cell to himself, a much larger one than before, and he was stretched out across his prison cot like a lazy cat. He was awake, not at all to Azula’s surprise, and he flashed the guards a crooked grin as they departed and left them there alone.

The man slunk to his feet, chains rattling as he moved, and he greeted her with a rasp. “Azula.” He stared at her through the bars, through layers of choppy, unkempt hair. It was silver streaked, now, and it fell down around his shoulders to tangle in his equally unkempt beard. 

“Was tonight your doing, father?” she hissed at him, refusing to meet his gaze. She’d not yet slept and beneath her cloak was her dress from the night before. Exhaustion clung to her limbs and itched at her eyes but she was determined not to let her father see her weak. She held herself carefully, stilling the tremor in her hands.

Ozai grinned. “I’ve no idea what you’re speaking of,” he said, but it dripped with sarcasm and she grit her teeth in the face of the lie.

“If the Avatar had died—”

He cut her off with an outlandish laugh. “There would have been war. And war will make this nation great again.” She refused to dignify it with a response and so he continued. “Ukano was a mistake, perhaps,” he said. “A fool of a man, too eager for his own good.” He stalked back and forth in his cell, chains rattling loudly in the silence.

Azula pursed her lips, fighting back an outburst. “You picked him to get to me, though.” She finally locked eyes with him and it was her own eyes staring back at her. “You picked him because you knew it would drag Mai into it.”

He laughed again and it echoed off the walls. “Ukano was an expendable idiot. His daughter, though—I had hoped to drag her in as well but she’s too loyal to you, and you’re too loyal to your mother.” He stopped his pacing and staggered forward towards the bars of his cell. “You could be an asset to me, Azula. The power you possess —” He paused to look her over, to think carefully upon his words. “Your devotion to this nation is misplaced. Your brother, your mother—They are holding you back. And my idiot brother would use you as his pawn to keep you from me.”

The anger that had been slowly growing within her burst forth and she lunged at him, curling her hands around the bars. “I am nobody’s pawn,” she screamed, standing only inches from him now. Her voice echoed up and down the corridor and, in the silence after, she realized she had given him exactly what he wanted.

Ozai stepped away, a wicked smile spreading across his face. “Your potential is wasted on them,” he said after a moment. “By my side, you could be powerful—”

“I  _ am _ powerful,” she snapped, clenching her hands into fists. “I am one of the Fire Lord’s most trusted—I will be a General one day. I will sit upon his council.” 

He sneered at her, wrapping his hands around the bars of the cell where her own once were moments before. “A  _ General? _ That is how he will reward you for your servitude to him?”

“ _ You _ were not even a General,” she hissed, and his eyes widened and something in him seemed to break just as it had in her.

“I was a  _ Fire Lord _ ,” he roared, his voice thundering in her chest. The lights in the sconces burned brighter for just a few moments before fading back down to a flicker and Azula’s heart caught in his throat. Though there was no method of truly removing his bending, the strict regimen of precisely made sedatives delivered to all prisoners capable of fire bending should have weakened Ozai’s power beyond anything but the smallest of flames. The chill of the room, deeper even than the rest of the prison, sapped away the rest.

A deep fear lodged itself in her and she felt ill. He stared at her steadily, a deep unnerving gaze that looked down into her soul and at last she cried out, “What do you want from me,” unable to take his stare anymore, and at once the flames in the sconces extinguished, plunging them in darkness. It lasted but a moment before a flame flickered to life before Ozai’s face, held aloft in his hand.

He grinned at her, wide and vicious.

Later, Azula sat in her room, alone at her vanity, staring into her own sunken and tired eyes. She felt vague and distant, her fatigue weighing hard upon her shoulders. Her father’s words rang in her ears— _ you could be powerful _ —and in her sleep deprived state they echoed around the room as if he were standing in front of her, mocking her as he did.

There was a knock at the door behind her and it swung almost immediately open to reveal her mother, who looked far away and near frightening in the reflection of the vanity’s mirror. She approached slowly, humming softly under her breath and in her hands was a cup of tea, steaming and hot, which she set gently before Azula, as she had every morning for years. The princess regarded it wearily, her hands shaking.

“Azula, sweetheart,” her mother whispered, though she sounded loud in the early morning silence. “You have a meeting in an hour.” Carefully, the woman reached forward and plucked from the counter Azula’s hair brush and set slowly about detangling her mess of hair. Her elaborate style from the night before, twisted into place carefully by Ursa herself, now hung limp and wild.

Azula sat for a while and allowed it, too tired to raise a fuss, and after a bit her mother stopped and rested her hands against her shoulders. Ursa did it when she was worried for her, and Azula could not decide if she loathed it or found it a comfort.

“Please, Azula, you need to drink your tea,” she said and Azula complied, the cup shaking in her hands. It was hot, still, and bitter to the taste— near pungent enough to make her gag, but she was accustomed to it now, after so long.

“I’ve arranged for Mai’s release,” her mother told her as she drank, and Azula’s hand froze, the smooth lip of the ceramic cup pressed against her mouth. She set it down slowly, nearly done, and gazed up at her mother’s face in the mirror. The woman looked as tired as Azula felt but she smiled all the same. “I don’t have reason to believe she was involved,” Ursa told her. “She readily gave us everything she knew of her father’s activities.” Carefully, Ursa swept her now smooth hair up, securing it in place. “It was her poison, but I do believe her when she says that it was stolen. She will be assisting me in finding an antidote.”

Azula sighed, a weight lifting from her. Quickly, she downed the rest of her tea. It was lukewarm now and she made a face, her stomach queasy. “When can I see her?” she demanded.

Ursa, without pause, slipped upon her topknot her royal hairpiece, which had been discarded upon the vanity, gently working it’s long, fine pins into place. Azula took a deep breath before finally pulling away and standing. “Soon enough,” her mother said, “But more important now is your meeting. The diplomats from the Earth Kingdom will be in no mood to wait, after last night.”

Azula nodded, “I—of course, yes,” and her father’s words tormented her anew.


	2. The Fire Lord, Part 1

In Ba Sing Se, no one spoke the name of the Fire Lord. There he was called “Dragon of the West” and there he was remembered as the man who had brought the city to the brink of ruin. The great city still bore the scars of those six hundred days, and it’s people—especially those in the outer ring, where Toph was only so seldom able to venture—remembered _. _ Too many families were no longer whole because of the actions of the man that now sat at the head of the Fire Nation.

It was no secret that his failure in the Siege of Ba Sing Se had been his undoing, but Toph knew little else about the man except—

She drew to an abrupt halt as she and Zuko neared the chambers of the Fire Lord, her heart stammering in her chest. She was to join the Fire Lord for brunch and, so close at last to finally meeting him, she found herself uncharacteristically anxious.

The Fire Lord had also killed the last Avatar.

“Are you alright?” Zuko’s hand curled around her elbow and she jumped, startled.

“Yes.” She didn’t move.

Zuko took a step forward, pulling her arm gently. Finally, she fell in line beside him once more. “You don’t need to be nervous,” he told her with a a small bit of humor in his tone. “My uncle is...” He paused for a moment to think on his choice of words before finally deciding on, “Easy-going. And he’s excited to meet you.”

At the door to the Fire Lord’s quarters were stationed several guards, before whom they briefly paused. Lian, who had accompanied her when Zuko came to collect her—Toph had introduced the woman as ‘Lian, she of little words’, to which Lian had responded with only an annoyed grunt—stopped as well. Toph, giving her no time to take advantage of the moment, gestured that she was to stay, and she took up a spot leaning against the wall some ways away.

Her absence the night before, at the worst possible moment, had only confirmed her uselessness in Toph’s mind; she had no interest in letting her guard overstep or overhear, especially in her meeting with the Fire Lord. Everything she saw and heard would undoubtedly follow her back to the ears of the Earth King.

The Fire Lord was indeed ill. His heartbeat was weak and his body frail and trembling, but he stood for her anyway and clasped her hands in his, refusing her bow. There was delight in his voice and his demeanor as he embraced her. "Avatar Beifong!"

Her heart rattled against her ribcage as she allowed the embrace. He was strong despite his sickness, his hands a fast grip against hers—hands with hard calluses and blunt nails.

Those same hands had taken the life of the previous Avatar.

In the South, nearer to Gao Ling and the coast, where Hama’s reign of terror was not only still visible in the landscape but also in the nightmares of those who had witnessed her firsthand, the Dragon of the West was instead remembered as the slayer of the terrifying Avatar Hama. It was an altogether different title.

To Toph, who now clasped hands with him in his extreme vulnerability, he was a tired leader and it struck her how alarmingly different he was from the Earth King, who, by contrast, was a vapid and neurotic man, with a penchant for what could only be described as  _ shenanigans _ .

Her nerves settled with the gentleness of his embrace and by the time she joined him at the table prepared for their brunch, she found herself far more at ease.

“My apologies,” the Fire Lord said as Toph took her spot on the cushion. He cleared his throat. “I wish that I had been able to give you a proper greeting, but alas—”

Toph shook her head. “I understand,” she said. “The circumstances, of course.” She let the statement hang, uncertain how best to articulate his poisoning and the political sabotage happening now right beneath her nose.

“Yes, yes,” he said. “But I am happy to say I’m feeling better by the day.” He did sound better, though his hearty laugh was interrupted by momentary coughing. Still, every movement he made was slow and deliberate, as if his entire body struggled to respond to him.

They exchanged small talk as they ate. Toph refused Zuko’s help and loaded her plate up by smell. Iroh poured her tea with shaking hands, which she happily accepted, and he took it as an opportunity to launch into a discussion on the flavor—Jasmine, his favorite—which was only brought to an end by Zuko’s polite changing of the subject.

The prince had not been wrong in describing his uncle as ‘easy-going’. Their banter was relaxed, even as Zuko had to occasionally guide the man from his musings. Zuko had a comfort around him that Toph had not yet encountered in her time with the Crown Prince, and it was an interesting dynamic to observe.

Before arriving in the Fire Nation, Toph had learned little of the current political state of the country. What she knew amounted to what most knew: over a decade prior, the previous Fire Lord had died suddenly, launching the nation into chaos; at some point in the coming year the man she now sat enjoying a meal with had risen to power, and had declared an immediate and abrupt end to the war. Most could fill in the blanks of what had happened in that missing time, but the details were kept behind tight-lipped stories.

The relationship, though, between Zuko and his uncle was telling, and Toph found herself endlessly curious to know the story there, but she’d know soon enough. So far her morning had been mum in regards to the attack the night before, but she suspected it’d be a topic broached eventually.

It seemed whatever strife had befallen the nation ten years prior was not altogether resolved. And though the Fire Lord had insisted he was feeling better, she could easily tell it was far from the case. His words, at times, appeared to come to him with some difficulty and his hands trembled more often than not. His frame was small, suggesting significant weight loss, and she was certain he could stand for only the briefest of periods.

As their meal wrapped up, the conversation shifted back to her and she found her nerves returned full force. The reality of her life sat in strange juxtaposition to her life as an Avatar; there was her life before and her life after _.  _ It was her life before people so rarely asked after, and even still, her best stories were hardly the sort that befit her status as an Avatar.

“Well,” she began, only barely remembering to swallow her food before she started talking. “I was born in Gao Ling and I lived there until I moved to Ba Sing Se a few years ago.” It didn’t occur to her until after she said it that any mention of Ba Sing Se was bound to bring with it awkwardness. Zuko, where he sat across from her, shifted uncomfortably for a moment, but the Fire Lord seemed unperturbed, so she continued, “I relocated there when I learned I was the Avatar.”

Her smile was tight, and between the lines what she really meant was:  _ I was dragged there kicking and screaming. _

“A truly remarkable city,” Iroh said.

Toph couldn’t help herself. “It’s alright,” she replied, and he laughed so hard that he briefly wheezed, which concerned Zuko considerably, as he leaned over to press a hand to his shoulder, an act that Iroh waved off.

“Tell me, how has your training as the Avatar come along?” he asked, when his breath returned to him.

“I mastered Earthbending some time ago,” Toph told them, and she felt relieved at the change in direction. “During my stay in Ba Sing Se I was able to refine my skills. I can also sandbend.” By the momentary spike in Zuko’s heart rate she knew he’d pieced together the connection to her briefly mentioned time in the Si Wong Desert. His assumption that it was a spiritual journey had truly been hilariously spot on. 

The Fire Lord stroked his beard. “Very impressive.” He slapped Zuko on the back and the prince let out an annoyed grunt at the action. “You are in good hands with my nephew. He is a master firebender  _ and  _ a master swordsman...”

* * *

Ursa was a prime example of what Azula knew was to be expected of her: prim, composed, quietly powerful. A woman who sat by the side of the Fire Lord, who shared in his confidence and whispered guidance into his ear; an advisor of such utmost importance that, in the absence of the Fire Lord himself, she sat as the head of the table of one of the most tense meetings Azula had ever been present for, and all attention remained on her.

“Gentlemen.” Ursa and Azula were the only women present, and the word leaving her tongue bore particular significance.

They sat in what was once a War Room, a place Azula knew well. She had memories of standing at her father’s side in that very room, listening to cranky old men argue. Now, she sat in the seat her father had once held, to the right hand of the throne of the Fire Lord, which sat empty. To her left was her mother, and for all of the attention she held she could have been seated on the throne herself.

Ursa’s word brought the whole room to silence and held it there. “I hope that we can all be in agreement that what transpired last night was not an attack on the Earth Kingdom.” No one spoke, everyone exhausted and weary from an already long morning of meetings, most of them on the most mundane of matters—the pouring over of a particular trade agreement on the cost of refined metals taking up the majority of it. The whole diplomatic affair was a bureaucratic nightmare of talks to decide what the next talks would entail. Azula was briefly jealous that her uncle had the enormous luck of being poisoned and therefore unable to attend.

And now they had the pleasure of dealing with the night before.

One of the younger men at the table, who Azula recalled was a cabinet member of some kind, and who had been the biggest nuisance so far, once again spoke up with his opinion. “I understand that this matter is a  _ family affair _ , so to speak,” he said it with a grin that made Azula’s blood boil, “But this assassination attempt also targetted our Avatar—”

Azula had had enough. “She is not  _ your _ Avatar,” she snapped.

Ursa cleared her throat, drawing attention back to her. “It is more than clear—and Avatar Beifong has herself confirmed this, as I have said—that this attack was one of opportunity. My son was the target, and the distraction of the party and the Avatar’s arrival was largely used to cover the assasination attempt.”

The man seated beside him was as over it all as Ursa and Azula were. With little more than a gesture he ended the whole thing. He was a general with a weathered appearance—and from the beginning he’d been the undisputed head of the diplomatic entourage.

His word was final, but Azula scarcely had time to be relieved, as the large doors of the chamber opened unexpectedly. She recognized her mother’s immediate anger at the intrusion by the subtle shift in her body language, but it didn’t last. The woman that entered was a guard who, unphased by all of the eyes on her, strode to Ursa’s side to whisper a hurried message into her ear.

The news, whatever it was, alarmed her, though Azula could only tell because she knew the woman so well. As the doors closed, Ursa stood, excusing herself and bidding the remaining Fire Nation officials proceed in her place. Azula, at her mother’s request, joined her.

The guard that had interrupted them was waiting, and Ursa took her aside to talk for a few more minutes, leaving Azula waiting. Just as she was nearing the end of her patience, her mother turned her way and gestured for her to follow. Ursa issued a few quiet instructions to the guard, who finally departed, and then they set off down the hallway.

It was only when they were substantially down the hall from the war room that Ursa told her what was going on, whispering it although they were both alone now. “Ukano is dead.”

Her mother’s hand found her shoulder, squeezing it tightly. It was a necessary gesture, because at once Azula felt her blood rush and her hackles raise as she struggled to keep her immense panic from bubbling forth. “Mai—”

“—is fine,” Ursa finished, “And she is being taken somewhere safe as we speak, don’t worry.”

Still, Azula worried. She took a few careful breaths, settling herself. Her mother’s hand fell away. “Come, now. We need to meet with Iroh urgently.”

When they arrived, the guards stepped aside without a word. They, too, were given hushed instructions, and one of them departed as another pushed the door open for them.

Iroh was sat at the head of the table before the fireplace, with the Avatar and her brother on either side. Everyone turned their way as they entered.

The Avatar seemed to immediately pick up on their worrisome body language, and across from her Zuko stood, alarmed. “What happened?”

Azula took in his panic and quickly swallowed down her own, determined not to let her brother see her in such a state. She scoffed as she took the spot next to him, their mother bidding him to sit. At last, Ursa took her own spot next to the Avatar, who looked to be particularly interested in what was going on.

Her uncle, as always, rolled with the interruption, continuing to sip at his tea as they settled in. It had been a few days since Azula had seen him, and though his color appeared to have returned a bit, his frail frame and stiff movements gave away how ill he truly was.

“Ukano was found dead in his cell,” Ursa told them at last.

Azula remembered Ukano less than fondly from her childhood. He had been a man too quick to reprimand Mai and too eager to conform; too eager to make her conform, as well. But the news was still worrisome and left a bad taste in her mouth. Ukano had been in the dungeons, awaiting interrogation.

Ursa continued, “The official cause of death is still unknown, however—”

“He was poisoned, wasn’t he?” Azula asked, and Ursa nodded.

“Sometime in the last hour. There was a shift change among the guards and it seems someone slipped in then.”

The silence that followed her statement was filled with dread.

Ursa forged ahead, turning to the Avatar. “Avatar Beifong, I have to again express my deepest apologies for the turmoil you’ve unexpectedly arrived in the middle of,” Ursa told her, “Under ideal circumstances, your safety under our care would never have been at risk.”

“Please,” Toph insisted. “No apologies are necessary. If anything I hope I might be able to help.”

Ursa nodded, folding her hands across her lap and letting out a soft sigh. Azula felt that sigh to her core, but she kept her own lips pressed into a tight line. “What happened last night,” Ursa began, “Is unfortunately the latest attempt by a growing resistance movement seeking to undermine the Fire Lord’s rule. Until Ukano revealed himself last night, we were unaware of any actively operating groups.”

"It is especially unfortunate, Toph, because this resurface in resistance is quite recent. We’ve had many years of peace. I had hoped that would be the Fire Nation you would arrive to find.”

The Avatar waved her words off, refusing to hear it. The girl, despite looking far less demure than she had the night before, sat every bit as regally as Azula herself had been taught to hold herself growing up in the palace. It ignited a curiosity in her to know more about this Avatar, who had arrived with so little known about her that they had not even been privy to her blindness. Her mother should have taken offense to the obvious slight against them by the Earth Kingdom. The Avatar herself, however, had so far proven to be surprisingly astute and observant.

Iroh began to cough before anyone could continue, and Ursa hurried to her feet and over to his side. He made a brief attempt to stop her but inevitably gave in, even as his coughing subsided into wheezes. 

"Let’s reconvene in the morning." Her mother supported him as he stood on shaky legs. "Tomorrow I will have more information. We can discuss our next steps then." She nodded in the Avatar’s direction. “Avatar Beifong, my son, I feel, can fill you in sufficiently before then.”

Azula climbed to her feet as well, eager to leave and not at all bothered if anyone else present noticed. Her armor was becoming stifling and her worry for Mai was fast forming a knot in her stomach she couldn't keep coiled. She turned to leave but her mother's voice stopped her dead.

"Wait," all eyes, not only Azula's own, found her mothers', and her expression was fierce and alarming. "This is important, all of you. Going forward, be careful what you say and who you trust. Someone was able to gain access to Ukano, and they knew when to do it.”

Azula’s gut twisted at her mother’s words. She met the woman’s eyes and they were frightening and reminded her that Ursa was indeed her father’s equal, that she now held the strings he once did.

She looked to her brother, who had stood at last. He looked anxious. His brow pinched above wide eyes, his lips pressed together tightly. Azula hated how vulnerable he allowed himself to be in front of them, how among family he thought it acceptable to show how fully he struggled with his feelings—and at the mention of their father, no less.

As if their father would be their reckoning.

* * *

_ Azula was Azulon’s favorite; he had held her in his arms when she had been a wailing newborn and named her for himself, at once enamored by her spirit and her fire. The sages whispered of her power and her potential, and Azulon listened. _

_ And watched. _

_ Azula knew he was not the firebender he used to be, and so she suspected his entrancement at her firebending was wound up in some old man power complex. But she didn’t care, because when she performed for him—and she came before him to firebend often, at his request—she enjoyed the attention, giddy that she could hold the eyes of the man on the most powerful seat in the world. It delighted her that it was so easy. _

_ “Is he  _ really  _ going to kill ZuZu?” _

_ Her mother was furious and her grip around Azula’s wrist as she dragged the girl behind her was bruising and painful and reminded her how fragile the bones there were. Azula bit it back, refusing to acknowledge that it hurt her. _

_ She snuck back out, of course, and when her mother found her it was clear she’d come looking for her. This time, when her hand took Azula’s to lead her along—noticeably in the opposite direction of her bedroom—it was gentle and trembling. Her mother took her to her father and for a brief moment she thought she was in trouble, that maybe her father’s hand was waiting to strike her this time instead of her mother's. But he grinned at the sight of her, and it was that look in his eyes that came to be so quintessentially a part of her father whenever she envisioned him in her mind. _

_ Those eyes. _

_ “I have something very important I need you to do, Azula,” he told her, as her mother vanished around the corner. She looked around and realized they were not far from the Fire Lord’s chambers, tucked away in the shadows of the large staircase leading to his wing. It was a good hiding spot, and it was one of many she and her brother tucked themselves into when they went creeping about the palace when they weren't supposed to be up. Like in that moment. "The Fire Lord is unwell." _

_ She frowned, confused at what that had to do with her; her grandfather was old and it was no secret that it was beginning to show. For some time his mind had been faltering. _

_ Her mother returned, a teacup and saucer in hand. The clink of ceramic on ceramic as she held it out with shaking hands was alarmingly loud, and Azula found herself holding her breath as she took the saucer from her mother, unbidden. _

_ It was fragrant with mint and chamomile. It's glossy surface shone up at her with barely a ripple, so steady had she willed her hands to be. _

_ Her father knelt down to her level. "We need you to take him his tea," he explained, and Azula met his eyes, a knot quickly forming in his stomach. "And make sure he drinks all of it." _

_ Azulon was indeed less than well, but his tired eyes lit up when he saw it was Azula and not his attendant arriving with his tea. Grief was a concept she struggled with, and as she had been reminded by the whispers of her peers, she lacked empathy and kindness, and so it was no surprise she felt nothing for the old man in his sad, exhausted state. He had lost his heir, and with that news had also come the added blow of the loss of Ba Sing Sei; he grieved on two fronts. _

_ He was already settled into bed and he beckoned for her to approach. "Ah, my dear, thank you." She stood straight as he blew gently at the steam rising from his tea before taking his first sip. Content with it, he gestured to a spot at the end of the large bed. "Sit with me a bit." _

_ By the time she had made herself comfortable the man had discarded his saucer in favor of simply cupping the teacup between his wrinkled hands. He, too, peered down into the liquid as Azula had moments before entering his quarters. Sometime between leaving her parents and coming before the large chamber doors she had realized what it was she was doing. Now, only a few sips into his tea, she wondered if he had realized it as well. _

_ She held her breath and at last he looked up and took another long swallow, clearing his throat after. _

_ A smile spread across her face as she took him in: his hair, outside of its bun, was thinning and wispy; his face, up close, was sallow and dimpled with age spots; his teeth, when he opened his mouth to drink, were yellow and horrid. She curled her lips and scrunched her nose, disgusted, an expression she dropped the moment he returned his eyes to her. He was not the frightening man who had struck her father only so many hours earlier, who had ordered, with no hesitation or remorse, the execution of his last remaining male heir. _

_ “Were you really going to do it?” she asked at last, when she could no longer hold it in, once she knew for certain that there was no going back. “Were you really going to have Zuko executed in the morning?” Azula dropped all pretense that there would be a morning for the old man, her curiosity finally getting the best of her. These were his last moments, and she alone got to bear witness to them. _

_ Azulon did not immediately answer. Instead, he looked down at his tea one final time, swirling the last of it about, eyes following the liquid as if in a trance. Then, abruptly, he brought it to his lips and tilted the last of it down his throat, which bobbed violently as he did so. “My dear girl,” he said at last, calmly placing the teacup back upon its saucer where it sat on the stand beside him. “If Zuko died in the morning, you would be the sole heir to my throne.” _

_ Her heart skipped a beat and her hands, where she had them curled in her lap, clenched themselves together. _

_ “You would be Fire Lord.” _

_ Azulon laughed. It echoed into her chest, rattled her ribs, tore through her and lit her on fire. Azula laughed too, unable to control herself, a sickening energy taking her that had her gasping for air between her wild laughter, had her shaking and trembling and barely able to keep herself upright. _

_ They stopped almost at the same time, the Fire Lord devolving into fits of coughing. She felt elated, her heart hammering now in sheer excitement and adrenaline. His fit died down and he met her eyes, still grinning like the mad man he was. “You will stay,” he said. “And watch me die.” _

_ It was clearly an order—his last command as Fire Lord, his last moment of power. Azula looked to the empty tea cup, considering it for a moment. She had fulfilled her instructions; she could leave now and she knew that there was nothing that the decrepit old man could do to stop her. _

_ “I want to tell you a story,” he added, and her twisted curiosity got the better of her. A story—his last story— _ and _ she got to watch him die. She was beside herself all at once. _

_ “I’ll stay,” she told him. _

* * *

Zuko’s plan, for the afternoon, was to take the Avatar _ —Toph,  _ he reminded himself—on a tour of the palace, to help acquaint her for the duration of her stay. It was woefully boring as he shuffled them down hallways filled with portraits of old men she couldn’t even see; Zuko himself wished sometimes that he couldn’t see them either—he much would have preferred to never have to co-exist with the haunted imagery that painted the complicated story of their Nation. Especially when it was his father’s very own visage that now looked back at him.

And most especially when it was the subject of his father he was very anxiously trying to find a way to bring up. It was a difficult subject to address, the events surrounding his rapid rise and descent chaotic and overwhelming and not at all the sort of horror that could be neatly summarized. 

"You are handling this very well," he decided to say at last.

Toph let out a low laugh, and he had to remind himself that it wasn't at him, and so he allowed himself to chuckle as well. "It's a nice change to have a little excitement," she told him after a moment. “I mean, I’m sorry and all about the attempted assassination—which, by the way, you are also handling quite well.”

It was not his first time hearing it called as such since the attack the night before, but hearing her say it now, just the two of them standing alone in a hallway, before the portrait of his father, it felt so much more real. He was the Crown Prince, the heir to the throne; an attempt on his life was an attack on the Nation. The significance that it bore made him ill.

If Iroh died, he would ascend the throne. If Zuko died, then the title of Fire Lord would fall to—

He scoffed the thought away. Azula had no interest in being Fire Lord, and regardless, the ensuing power vacuum would create chaos not only in the Fire Nation, but out through the rest of the world, so entangled as they had finally begun to be. Maybe that had been the whole point, only—

If his father was involved in any way, then this chaos was but a harbinger of what was to come.

“So...” Toph began, pulling him from his stupor. He tore his eyes from the face of his father to look at her again. “I guess you’re supposed to fill me in on that, right? Why someone wants you dead?”

Someone wanted him dead, or at the very least wanted to sow chaos by proxy of his death—and maybe that someone wasn’t his father, but at the very least his father’s influence wasn’t absent from the ideology behind it.

Zuko cleared his throat. “Yes,” he began. “About that.” 

* * *

_ There was something wrong with Azula. All morning she had refused to look at him, and they had had little else to do but stand in close proximity and exist quietly, as was expected of them. Her avoidance of him was obvious, especially so when she shied away every time he’d tried to talk with her earlier that morning. _

_ Zuko knew that Azulon favored his sister, but he could not delude himself into thinking that she had held any fondness for their grandfather in return. His death was hardly sudden, either—Azulon had been ninety-five, as the sage declared during the eulogy. And Azula had no empathy. Something was wrong and it wasn’t grief. _

_ His mother was unreadable, and entirely unresponsive to whatever frivolous thing had Azula so wound up. She, too, had been acting off. She’d been strangely muted as she had ushered them about in preparation for the funeral, her tone stern when she did speak. _

_ Now, his sister stood ramrod straight next to him, dressed in their matching white mourning robes, as the pyre that held the body of the Fire Lord was lit aflame by the sages. He squeezed his eyes closed against the immense heat that billowed forth and, when it had cleared, he opened them to find Azula had momentarily looked his way. _

_ Though she was composed, he could see it now—her eyes betrayed her. _

_ She had been crying. _


	3. The Fire Lord, Part 2

“When Fire Lord Azulon died, my father launched a plot to take the throne for himself. My Uncle Iroh was the Crown Prince, but he had just lost his son in the war.”

Zuko still struggled to remember his cousin; Lu Ten had left to join the war some years before his death, when Zuko had been young. The young man’s still youthful face haunted him from the few portraits that remained. If he had lived, would Lu Ten have taken the throne and ended the war as his father did? Would Lu Ten have been standing there in Zuko’s place?

“And since my uncle was half a world away, in Ba Sing Se, he was particularly vulnerable. It was easy for my father to make an attempt on his life and lay claim to the crown.”

* * *

_“Where is Uncle Iroh?” Zuko asked as his mother helped him into his formal robes for his father’s coronation. It had been only three days since the passing of Fire Lord Azulon, and they had been filled with chaos as people came and went from the palace. His mother had been almost entirely absent, and, with all of the happenings between the funeral and the coronation, this was his first moment with her alone. “Why is—why isn’t he—”_

_Zuko had only just the day before learned that it was his father to be crowned Fire Lord, and ever since, a sick feeling had begun twisting itself into his gut._

_Azulon was dead._

_Lu Ten was dead._

_His mother stilled, clenching her hands together tightly. She didn’t respond, but she didn’t need to. Azula had entered the room at some point, sneaky as always, and heard his question._

_“He’s dead.”_

_Zuko rounded on her, angry, shouting,“You’re lying!” and his mother caught him by the shoulders, pulling him back._

_“It’s true,” Azula said. “He threw himself off the walls of Ba Sing Se in shame.”_

_Zuko looked to his mom, searching for the truth, hoping she would chastise Azula as always for lying and being cruel. His mom only looked back at him with wet eyes._

_“She’s telling the truth. Iroh is dead.”_

* * *

Toph faced ahead, perhaps aware of where they stood and the magnitude of it. Ozai’s eyes burned back at them, one of many terrifying golden eyes that lined the corridor. For eight months, the man had been Fire Lord, and his influence was everywhere, because it had been Ozai that followed in Sozin’s footsteps. 

“Ah,” Toph said in understanding. “Attempted regicide?”

Zuko nodded. “Of a sorts. My father’s men reached my uncle before news of the Fire Lord’s death had. He did not even see them coming.” He and his uncle had bonded over the stories the man had shared with him about his adventures in the Earth Kingdom, while roughing his way back to the Fire Nation to retake his throne. “My father, ironically, didn’t see Iroh coming either. He let my father believe the attempt on his life had been successful, and subsequently let the whole world think he was dead until he could maneuver himself back into a position to reclaim his crown.”

* * *

_The Coronation of Fire Lord Ozai was majestic._

_It took place under the blazing noon sky, in the height of the summer season, when the heat became visible ripples hanging in the air and the glare of the sun left halos hanging in the irises of onlookers. The cracked, barren earth surrounding the palace was filled with citizens of the Nation, eager to catch a look at their new Fire Lord, eager to help hasten in a new Era, eager to fill the void of grief left in the wake of the loss of the previous Fire Lord and the untimely deaths of his heirs._

_Zuko’s father stood at the precipice of the atrium of the palace entrance, robed in red silks and adorned in ornaments of gold; the High Sage stood before him and, as his father knelt, affixed into his hair the royal headpiece. It’s delicate gold prongs caught the sunlight, and the sight of it set the crowd alight._

_Zuko and his sister watched the view from another vantage point, gathered with their mother, generals, councilman and the like—a menagerie of faces he didn’t recognize—all of them standing perfectly in line, he and Azula beside one another in front of their mother, with hands tucked behind their backs in respect._

_The chanting of the crowd was maddening and loud as Ozai rose to his feet, and in the heat of the moment his father turned back to them where they stood, beckoning them forward. Zuko looked back at his mother in a brief moment of panic, only to see that she, too, had her eyes wide in terror, her mouth pressed tight with one, trembling hand pressed against it._

_His father’s eyes—narrow, with blown pupils—and his accompanying smile—wild and teethy—assured them that he was serious. His mother’s hand found Zuko’s shoulder, squeezing it tightly for a moment. Zuko caught the sound of her voice over the roar of the crowd, and looked back only to see her whispering softly to herself. Beside him, Azula stood alarmingly still, eyes staring ahead._

_After barely a moment more had passed, his mother swept forward to increased furor from the crowd. Ozai held his hand out to her and she took it with nimble fingers and allowed him to pull her against him._

_The heat made the people restless and crazed. They cried out on adoration, chanting for their Lord and their Lady. Ozai gave his wife a quick kiss and then they turned and_ together _faced the crowd, a picturesque image of love and joy to their people._

_Then his father leaned in close once more and, in the guise of planting a kiss to her cheek, Zuko saw his lips move as he murmured something into her ear. His mother's face remained almost expressionless at whatever he said, but he knew his mother._

_It was just another face she was forced to wear._

* * *

“Interesting,” Toph said, her face slanted upwards so that her bangs fell back, revealing the milky hue of her eyes. “And your father is still alive?”

Zuko pursed his lips together and nodded. “There was a trial,” he told her after a moment, considering how best to continue. The trial had been tumultuous, but it was those months before, when Ozai had held the nation in an iron grip, that stood most starkly in his mind.

Zuko had spent more of his life without war than with it, but the war was what had seeped into all of the crevices of his life and left him someone different, someone irreparably shaped by what his nation and his ancestors had done to the world. 

“Even though my uncle had returned, and held rightful claim, the transition wasn’t without it’s conflict. Ending the war was extremely unpopular.”

Toph sighed, dipping her head and blowing her now scattered hair from her face. “What a shame,” she said.

* * *

_Zuko became very familiar with the throne room in the months that followed the coronation. It seemed to please his father immeasurably to have his wife and children at his side as he ruled, and it was an increasingly vicious rule that he forced them to bear witness to._

_Four months into his reign, Ozai began the executions, and Zuko and his mother and his sister were made to sit and watch him enact his punishment on those who had displeased him._

_The man who had been brought before his father this time was someone Zuko recognized. He was a high-ranking admiral, and, more importantly, had been a close friend of his uncle’s, a man fiercely loyal to the crown._

_And the Crown Prince, who Ozai very much was not._

_Zuko had heard the rumors, though acknowledging them or speaking them aloud was treason and would just assuredly see him in the same spot as the poor man he now looked upon._

_Somewhere out there, Iroh was alive._

_And he was coming._

_His father read no charges to the man and said no words before he stepped from his throne to approach the bedraggled prisoner where he was forced to kneel. Beside Zuko, his mother sat with her knees tucked neatly beneath her, vacant eyes fixed dead ahead._

_“They say burning alive is the most painful way to die,” Azula had told him scarcely a few weeks before, after the first series of executions had taken place. Zuko suspected she enjoyed watching them because she, like his mother, refused to turn away._

_But Zuko couldn’t watch. By the time the man’s skin started to char, well before he stopped screaming, Zuko had already forced himself to look elsewhere._

_He couldn’t block out the screams, though. Or the smell._

* * *

The barren earth surrounding the palace made for excellent training grounds, and the late afternoon sun made the eastern side comfortable as it began to cast the shadow of the palace across the baked earth. Every step Toph took—at last with bare feet against earth—spilled up dust and cracked the hardened dirt. It felt familiar and she grinned as she moved to her spot some ways across from Zuko, excited to be back in her natural element.

Toph stretched as she waited, cracking joints and feeling, unfortunately, the aches from the attack the night before. Then she turned to face Zuko, popping her knuckles together, widening her stance.

"Don't you dare go easy on me."

She knew he would, though, because she was blind. She smirked and took her position, letting the tension roll from her shoulders, falling into a comfortable posture with her arms up in front of her. They would only be sparring—testing the waters and feeling one another out—but Toph was ready to throw down. And if he wanted to go easy on her then that would just make it hurt all the more when she knocked him on his ass.

Zuko’s movements gave him away: the whisper of his feet across the dry ground spilled about small rocks; the rustle of his clothing as he swung a leg out to begin bending—a move she already found herself wanting to replicate—was harsh; the whistle of fire as it cut through the air, at last, in her direction, was loud and ringing. Toph sidestepped a number of flames with ease and, when it became a sudden barrage, she instead summoned up a neat slab of earth to block it.

With the slab standing between her and Zuko, she had a moment to decide her first proper step. And it only took a single step—Zuko lurched forward into a run towards her and, his movements now so easily predictable, she bent a piece of earth up to catch his foot as it came down, doing so with such force that it sent him tumbling to the ground onto his shoulder.

He let out a loud, unprincely-like swear and Toph laughed in a very unlady-like way, dropping the slab of rock she’d raised.

“That was the same shoulder I fell on last night,” Zuko groaned as she caught his hand to haul him to his feet.

She gave him a toothy grin. “I know.”

He laughed, dusting himself off. “How do you do it?” he asked, “How are you able to—” He full-stopped, no doubt stumbling through some way to better articulate his question. His heart stuttered in his chest as he finally settled on, “...see?”

“I see with earthbending.”

“Oh?”

Toph chuckled, sweeping a foot out across the ground in front of her. “I have this _connection_ with the earth,” she continued. She had explained it before, in a number of different ways, but she often found that the more simply she explained it, the more easily others seemed to understand it. “I can feel the vibrations of everything around me. I can even feel your heart beating in your chest right now.” Zuko’s heart beat faster at that, and she laughed. “I also have excellent hearing, so between the two I usually have a pretty accurate visual of the world around me. So to speak.”

“Pretty accurate is an understatement,” Zuko said, “It sounds like you see the world better than I do.”

It was Toph’s turn for her heart to stutter, and she turned away to hide her blush. “I guess,” she agreed, shrugging. “Anyway, do you wanna go again?”

“Absolutely.”

* * *

By the time Toph made it back to her room she was filthy, and Jin took one look at her and chuckled before heading off to run her a bath. The other woman was in great spirits, having returned only recently from going out into the city—Toph had insisted she had little enough for Jin to do to stay holed up in the palace with her all morning.

Toph, too, was in a great mood; she was covered in dirt and, though she still ached from her tumble during the explosion the night before, the new aches from her spar were quite satisfying. Zuko was one of the best sparring partners she had encountered since leaving Gao Ling, and more exciting, he was the first firebender she had ever witnessed.

He was truly as much a master of his element as she was of hers, and she was going to be learning firebending from him.

When her bath was at last ready, Toph sank into the hot water with a happy sigh, letting her head fall back to rest on the gentle slope of the tub’s edge. She had sent Jin to acquire her fire nation clothing, because she had convinced Zuko to go into the town with her, and for the first time all day she was completely alone. Even Lian, who had stood against the palace wall watching her and Zuko all during their spar, was now far enough away Toph could hardly place her.

It was a much needed moment of peace and calm that unfortunately didn't last long enough, as Jin was quick to return.

"Don't worry," Jin told her a bit later, when Toph was dry and reaching for the clothes the other woman had provided, "I made sure to get an outfit with pants." Toph chuckled, pleased. Jin was really growing on her. "And I stocked your wardrobe with a number of other items in Fire Nation colors for you."

"I appreciate it," Toph told her, slipping the trousers on. The material was a rough cotton with a loose weave to make it more breathable, and the accompanying top was a simple halter, which exposed more than she was used to. She was quickly discovering that Fire Nation fashion was far less conservative than in the Earth Kingdom, and though Toph had little care for being modest, the ensemble still felt awkward on her.

At least she would be more comfortable with the heat, she supposed.

Toph wrangled her own hair up, uncertain of how hair was worn among commoners in the nation, but still fairly certain that she could, at the very least, manage that herself.

"Oh!" Jin exclaimed as she finished, and Toph turned her way, startled. "I bought you something in town."

 _Oh_. Toph flushed a bit, embarrassed both at receiving a gift and at knowing Jin had used, on her, a portion of the pay Toph had insisted be advanced to her before the trip. Her father was one of the richest men in all of the Earth Kingdom, and she made sure her staff was always well reimbursed. And Jin had been bubbling with excitement at the coming journey.

"That really wasn't necessary," Toph managed, but Jin refused to hear it.

"It's just a little something," she insisted, coming over to her. Jin was considerably taller than Toph, and she easily tucked her gift into her hair, affixing it in place with two small pins above each ear.

"A hair accessory," Jin explained as Toph reached up to carry her fingers across it. It was smooth and not unlike her preferred hair band, only it was very obviously made from metal—copper. Jin had settled it just against the loose bun she'd formed herself, and it stayed in pace comfortably.

“I love it!” Toph exclaimed.

* * *

Zuko had suggested they venture into the city proper with significant trepidation, but Toph had immediately pushed aside any of his worries and eagerly insisted they journey outside of the palace. He could understand her desire to get out, as he spent more time in the palace than he would have liked as well, but the recent attack—not even twenty four hours past—still weighed heavily in his mind, and in his bones—he certainly still felt the night before. The Avatar, though, was not at all to be deterred.

He arranged for several imperial guards to go ahead of them, to assure they would not encounter trouble, and two more followed behind them at a substantial distance away to give them privacy. He suspected that the Avatar's personal guard was likely somewhere watching as well, though he hadn't yet caught sight of her himself. 

The Capital City was broken into two sub cities: Caldera City, which sat in the crater at the top of the mountain; and Harbor City, which hugged the coast and filled the valley, spilling up into the mountains as the city limits faded out into the wild landscape. The journey from the top of the mountain and down into Harbor City was less than easy or quick, by design, made a more difficult trip by the zigzag of the roads carved into the mountain; the ascension was worse, of course, because that involved making the same trip _uphill._

A roughly thirty minute walk made for a long amount of awkward silence to fill, and so he explained to her the roads, the defenses, the dead volcano whose crater the Palace was cradled by. Toph was surprisingly interested, even though most of what he spouted were boring facts straight from the textbooks, though with less of the imperialistic ‘niceties’ that accompanied those facts.

The Avatar walking with him now—comfortable, relaxed, clothed in red and dark cotton fabric—was a sharp contrast to the Avatar he had greeted upon her arrival. It had seemed wise to blend in, which for both of them had been dressing down and for Toph, in particular, had meant shedding her Earth Kingdom colors. Even her hair was now pulled up quite simply and fixed beneath the slope of a shiny copper head band, the metal of choice amongst the commoners. Despite being in the colors of the Fire Nation, the entire outfit suited her far more than anything he’d seen her in so far.

He understood, because he found he was also far more comfortable in common clothing.

“What would you like to do in the city?” he asked as they neared the base of the mountain and the ground at last began to grow flatter. “There are shops and a few different beach fronts, and of course, there’s food.”

“Oh,” Toph perked up considerably at the mention of food. “I’m actually very hungry. And Jin—my attendant—she told me about this noodle place down near the Harbor District.”

Zuko frowned. The Harbor District was a poorer part of the city, not known for being especially safe or worth a visit. He had never ventured there himself—and really he seldom ever even came into the city—so he had little knowledge of the area besides the snide comments made by the residents of Caldera City.

The sun wouldn’t set for a few hours yet, however, and Zuko found himself also rather eager to go and actually see it for himself, especially as Toph went on about the meal they would have there, and he was increasingly reminded of his own hunger. And Jin, it seemed from Toph’s chatter, had managed just fine.

It turned out their destination was on the outer edges of the district, where the industrial area began to spill out into the suburbs; where the distinctive cobbling of the harbor began to break down from lack of upkeep, eventually becoming dirt packed paths; where the dirty metal buildings that were home to the factories and factory workers became rough structures of lime plaster and exposed rebar. Toph stopped at one of several doorways in a large, modge-podge of a building cut into the mountain, sweeping back the curtain to let him enter first, which he did with mild embarrassment.

The smell was enough to make his stomach growl, a wonderful mix of hot spices that made his nose burn just the slightest bit, mingling deliciously with the deep, brothy smell of meat. “Oh Agni,” he mumbled, inhaling deeply. 

Toph beamed as they were seated at a beat up table. While she seemed content to wait calmly—albeit with as much hunger in her as he had, no doubt—he couldn’t stop his eyes from swinging around, taking in the property and it’s lowliness: the barren walls; the dilapidated counter upon which ready food was slid across to be brought to the patrons; the worn out floor, awash in tiles that were more broken than whole. But the smell was something he knew Toph and he shared in, and he tried to focus on that to override his discomfort.

Food arrived quickly: two heaping bowls of hot noodles over a deep red sauce, brought with a number of accoutrement, which included pickled vegetables, fresh herbs, and infused oils. He quickly discovered they made the noodles all the spicier, and watched, bemused, as Toph added a bit of everything.

“The food here is amazing,” Toph said after her first bite, slurping a stray noodle down between words.

Zuko enjoyed how unapologetically herself she was outside of the stuffy walls of the palace, and how fully she expressed herself, her feelings flitting across her face with ease. It helped a great deal with his own nervousness at being somewhere so unfamiliar and different from what he was used to.

“You seem to be adjusting very well,” he told her, for lack of something to say. "I'm happy to see."

She nodded. "The Fire Nation is definitely different," she told him between bites, "But it also comes with a lot of freedom. I’ve never been free to just—" Toph trailed off for a moment, and Zuko knew she was weighing out what to say, how _much_ to say. He knew the feeling, having felt it himself while deciding how best to tell her about his father, without revealing too much. “I’m free to just be the Avatar, here,” she admitted at last.

They fell into silence for a while as they ate, which was interrupted only briefly by the young man that worked the counter coming by to check in on them.

“I’d like for us to rise with the sun tomorrow,” Zuko began when he was done, pushing his now empty bowl aside. “And go through firebending forms.”

Toph was still chowing down—now working on finishing her second bowl—and she spoke, at first, with her mouth full, “Seriously?!” before seeming to realize herself. She quickly swallowed her food before continuing. “How early is sunrise?”

Zuko thought about it for a second before deciding to overshoot the time a bit, for her sake. “Six.” Toph groaned, which made Zuko laugh. “Not much of a morning person?”

She shook her head. “I used to sneak out a lot,” she explained, stacking her now empty bowl in the first she’d finished. “It made me a bit of a night catowl.”

“Really, now?” For Zuko, sneaking out meant lurking around the palace or the gardens to spy on nobles—an activity that, growing up, began and ended with Azula’s bad influence. He chuckled at this new side of her he was seeing. “We’ll have to swap stories about that some time.” 

* * *

_Azula woke him in the middle of the night, and her presence beside him when he opened his eyes frustrated him. He pushed her away, tossing the blankets over his head. “It’s late, Azula,” he mumbled._

_The next time her hand touched him it was painful. Small fingers curled around his shoulder again, but this time they were alight just the slightest bit, burning the blankets and his clothing and angering the skin beneath. He threw himself upright, crying out and shoving her hard._

_She landed on the ground with a thump and unnerving silence followed, before, “Zuko.” He froze at the sound of her voice, tearing his eyes from where they had been glued to the scorch marks on his robe to look at her in alarm. Something was wrong and in the distance, he could hear shouting. “We need to go.”_

_They headed towards the noise, sticking close to the walls. Almost every sconce had been extinguished, and their way was lit by moonlight and the red-glow of flames burning outside of the palace. Azula still had told him nothing, and she clung to his elbow like a vice as she pulled him along with her. He wanted to stop her, to demand an answer, but he also knew there was danger and there wasn’t time._

_So he allowed her to lead him directly to the hallway just outside of the throne room, where they were met by their parents._

_His mother’s eyes were bloodshot and ringed dark, the wrinkles beneath them stark and frightening. In the months that had passed since his father’s coronation, it had come to seem as if another person had taken her place, one that wasn’t entirely there. Standing beside his father, dressed in her sleeping gown, she was wispy and terrifying to look at. Her eyes were empty as she cast them over her children, and Zuko surged forward to cling to her robes._

_“What’s going on?” he cried out to her, terror taking him._

_His father answered, seizing him by the arm and pulling him from his mother. “They’ve taken the harbor,” he snarled, not so much to Zuko as to the open air. Zuko looked around to see imperial guards tucked into the shadows, a few of them fanning out around them._

_His mother took Azula by the hand, which his sister allowed much to his surprise. The girl looked frazzled, and her eyes seemed to reflect their mother’s eyes. “Come along,” the woman said, following in Ozai’s footsteps as they moved. Zuko lost track of their path as they wound down narrow hallways he’d never seen before, and eventually down stairways tight enough they had to go single file, until eventually they reached what Zuko immediately knew to be a bunker for them to hide in._

_Azula, as the door slid closed behind them, sealing them in, met his eyes. “Uncle’s coming,” she whispered to him, and even though she said it so softly he almost didn’t hear it., Zuko could still make out the sing-song tone in her voice. Slowly, a frightening grin spread across her face._

* * *

There was a little known spot of beach that hugged the outermost edge of the city that Zuko remembered from a decade of looking at maps of the place, and by the time they arrived there the sun was finally beginning to hang low in the sky. It cast long, lean shadows across the white sands, which flickered and bobbed and as they walked.

The beach was part of a small grotto, blocked in on one side by the sharp, towering cliffs that demarcated the northern boundary of the city, and on the other by a large natural trench cut through the water by the rise and fall of the tide, where it spilled against large, jagged boulders. 

Toph was delighted by all of it, breaking into a run down to where the water lapped the shore, sending sand flying about. She didn't stop until the water was halfway up her calves, soaking the bottoms of her pants.

Zuko had noticed sometime during their walk down that she was barefoot, but he had to take a few minutes to get out of his own shoes and to roll his pants legs up before finally joining her.

"Are you able to bend water?" he asked as she kicked at the waves. Toph stopped almost at once at his question.

"Am I able to?" she echoed, leaning down to cup some of the ocean water in her hands. "Yes. But _can_ I?" Toph sighed, standing up straight and letting the water slip away through her fingers. "No. I've never been able to do it intentionally."

For a moment, Zuko thought he had ruined the mood with his question. But finally she turned back his way, splashing water in his direction, likely fully aware of his desire to stay as dry as possible. "I can sand bend though!"

Zuko followed her back onto the beach and watched as she stood, head cocked thoughtfully to one side, arms held out in front of her. Then she moved forward, stomping heavily onto one foot and drawing her arms back. The result was almost immediate: a neat structure rose up out of the sand and, as he watched it settle, he realized it was a tiny replica of the Fire Nation Palace.

He bent down near it to get a closer look, awed at the level of detail she had managed. She had even created the correct number of stairs leading up to the giant slab doors, which stood ajar, revealing rays of light that filtered through the sand above, giving away it's fragility. "This is unbelievable," Zuko managed at last, finally reaching out to touch it.

His fingers brushed against a sand wall for the briefest moment before the entire thing collapsed, startling him considerably. He stumbled back upright, upset with himself for ruining it, only to see Toph shaking with silent laughter, a hand pressed to her mouth to hide her grin.

"Sorry," she said, coming over and waving her hand, dissolving the last of the structure back into granules of sand, which caught the breeze and swept down into the swirling ocean waters. “I couldn’t help myself.”

He laughed as well, shaking his head at her behavior.

* * *

_At some point, Azula had begun to giggle and, as her peals of laughter grew louder, Ursa clutched the girl close, pressing a hand tight over her mouth in an attempt to quiet her._

_It didn't matter._

_They were already found. Fighting grew closer by the moment and there was nowhere left for them to go, holed up in the bunker as they now were. It was futile, and they all knew it._

_The palace had been breached. The throne room had been taken. Now all that was left was to wait._

_"Come here, boy," Ozai demanded. His voice was a snarl of words as he grabbed Zuko and manhandled him into a kneel. Zuko—confused and scared—did not fight it at first, simply crying out in pain as his knees were forced to hit the hard ground. His father shoved something to his mouth—a vial of liquid, he realized—and Zuko frantically turned his head and attempted to scramble away._

_Ozai released him, but only so that he could strike Zuko hard across the face, sending him sprawling and disorienting him enough that, this time, when Ozai hauled him up once more, he found himself only barely able to struggle. Warmth formed at Zuko's temple, sticky running down his face, and he realized he'd hit his head in the fall. His vision swam._

_“Should have killed you then,” his father hissed, catching him by the jaw, sharp fingers digging into the hollows of his cheek to force his mouth open. “This cursed bloodline—”_

_Somewhere in the distance, Zuko was vaguely aware that Azula was still laughing, her wild howls becoming less and less controlled, a hysteria taking over her voice that rattled his skull._

_Ozai stopped abruptly, throwing him to the ground in rage, and turned on her, instead. Zuko, from where he now lay heaped on the floor, watched as Ozai tore Azula from the arms of their mother, and quite suddenly the laughter became a scream._

_She was smaller than him, and Ozai took her with ease by her throat and shook her. "Shut up!" The vial of poison caught the light, sparkling like glitter, and Azula screamed and kicked as he tried to force it on her as he had his son._

_Zuko tried to cry out and pull himself up, but his body refused to listen, obeying, instead, the horrid pain growing in his head, which filtered the world around him through fuzz._

_The screams and the shouting—his mother had joined the fray—ebbed and flowed until suddenly his ears popped angrily, and all he could make out was a violent roar. The room had begun to grow brighter and hotter, his father's anger flaring and mixing with something entirely unplaceable._

_Zuko made one last attempt to move, one hand scrambling at the stone floor, fingernails catching in the rough grooves. All around him the world howled and burned, and Zuko at last blacked out. The last thing he remembered was the sight of his father's back becoming a black shadow silhouetted by the glow of a halo._

* * *

The safe place where Ursa had squirreled Mai away turned out to be Azula's very own room, outside of which were now extra guards.

Now, so many hours later, Mai lay curled up in Azula’s bed, face buried beneath pillows. What was visible of her black hair shone brightly in the early morning sunlight. Azula sat at her vanity, drinking her tea and sneaking occasional glances at the woman curled up in the reflection of her mirror.

Mai had shed no tears—little surprise given her typical emotional detachment—but she’d spent the early morning hours awake—restless and listless. Azua felt for her in a way perhaps others couldn't. She thought about Ozai in his cell, lit by the glow of his own, forbidden firebending; it seemed the very same face stared back at her now through the mirror: the same angles, the same shadows, the same slant of the jaw; the wildness in her smile betrayed her.

Mai stirred, the blankets shifting about as she raised herself upright. Her eyes were red and puffy—perhaps from her exhaustion or perhaps from tears she’d refused to let Azula see her shed. Azula watched her in the mirror as she carefully slipped from the bed and breezed across the room. Only when she was within reach did Azula move to look directly at her, extending her hand so that the other woman could clasp it in her own. Her hand was frigid to the touch and Azula pulled it to her face to let her warm breath ghost over it.

“Azula…” Mai began, goosebumps running up her pale arm, and Azula abruptly let her hand go. She stood just as quickly, pulling herself up to Mai’s level, straightening her shoulders. Mai always had been and always would be taller than her, but Azula had a presence that dwarfed everyone around her. Finally, she met Mai’s eyes. They were unreadable and Azula let out a breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding. She drew away and Mai didn’t follow her.

“I have to leave soon,” she told her, undoing the belt on her robe. She let it fall from her shoulders, leaving her nude save for her underclothes. “I have a meeting.” The first of many. She could feel Mai’s eyes on her as she moved about the room getting ready, finally pulling from her wardrobe her royal armor. It was a process to put on and Mai, unprompted, strode across the room to assist her. She knew its ends and outs as well as Azula did, having helped her in and out of it so many times before. And Azula allowed the help, obediently tilting her head and holding her hair back as Mai guided the final piece onto her shoulders, pulling through the collar of the robes from beneath it. Azula rolled her neck and cracked her shoulders as the weight settled and Mai’s hands drifted to her waist to finish securing her belt there.

Those same hands, when finished, squeezed her hips gently, pulling her back and flush against Mai’s chest. She murmured something Azula couldn’t quite catch against the back of her neck, her lips pressing carefully against the skin there, her warmth searing into her. “It’s heavy,” Azula murmured, letting her head fall back onto Mai’s shoulder, baring her neck further.

“I know,” Mai whispered back into her hair, but Azula barely heard her because in that moment something caught her eye and she let her head lol to the side to see her father’s reflection staring back at her in the mirror across the room. His eyes were bright and gold and _frightening,_ and he looked back at her with a sinister smile. _“You’ll be Fire Lord someday, Azula.”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> All of your comments seriously mean a lot :) Thanks y'all.


	4. More Questions than Answers

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the belated update. I was pretty determined to make this and the next chapter one longer chapter but it looks like it just isn't meant to be, so yet again I'm breaking it up.

Rising with the sun meant a tired, cranky Toph, and she arrived exactly as promised, rubbing sleep from her eyes and choking on a yawn. For all that Zuko had claimed firebenders rose with the sun, he was not exactly lively himself. He was still catching up on the lost sleep he’d accumulated in the days leading up to the Avatar’s arrival, and last night he had lain awake into the late hours, turning over his thoughts.

Zuko had come to several strong conclusions on Toph and her bending:

First, she was without a doubt a master of her mother element.

Second, she had combat experience. She understood how to balance offense and defense, she had a strong reaction time, and she was decisive and swift.

And lastly, she was going to be an excellent firebender. There was an energy in her that seemed to simmer just beneath the surface; the challenge, now, was to bring it forward and turn it into fire.

Toph huffed out a frustrated sigh, dropping from another set of forms, which she had performed with more ease than Zuko had expected. She followed instructions well, but it was clear she had a stubborn streak and was nearing the end of her patience.

They took an eventual break for food, moving to sit and chat along the side of the open air arena he had selected for their continued training; it's perimeter was lined with large columns, which gave them privacy and shade, and they settled beside one. Toph made herself comfortable, legs akilter, and set upon the fruit her attendant had recently dropped by for them.

Zuko watched as she pressed a dirty thumb between the peel and the flesh of the fruit and took a sip of his water, freshly poured from the nearby jug. “You’re doing well, Toph. I think you will be a strong firebender.”

She slipped a segment of fruit into her mouth, making a thoughtful noise. Finally, she responded, “Maybe.”

In his time with her so far, Zuko had discovered she was far from humble, and it surprised him to see the slip in her confidence. “Tell me,” he began, deciding on a different direction, “About how you learned earthbending.”

This time she took far longer to answer, chewing on the thought alongside another piece of fruit. “I had an earthbending instructor.” Zuko opened his mouth to answer, a quick  _ ‘oh’ _ on the edge of his lips, but Toph kept going. “He was useless though. I actually learned earthbending from the badgermoles.”

“The badgermoles?” Zuko could recall them barely from his school years; when he had been young he’d spent much of his time pouring through picture books of beautifully illustrated images of the animals of the world, his fingers tracing across the coarse paper until he was chastised for it, lest he ruin the pages. The badgermoles, if he recalled, had been large, lumbering creatures with pointy faces and small eyes.

“Yeah, the badgermoles were the very first earthbenders, or so it's said.” She sighed, discarding her peel. “When I was five years old I ran away from home and got lost.” She was quiet for a moment, tilting her head back so that her hair fell back and exposed her face. “I ended up underground in a maze of tunnels. And then the badgermoles found me.” She smiled softly. “Or maybe I found them. Either way, they saved me. For days I wandered underground in their care, learning their way of seeing the world and learning their way of interacting with it through bending.” Toph swung her head his way, casting her vacant eyes in his direction. “Badgermoles are blind, like me. We understood each other. I learned more about earthbending in my brief time with them than with any instructor I have ever had.” 

There was something deeper to her words, a significance that sounded itself in her tone, in the way her voice dipped as she told him the story: it made her sad to tell it, not because it was a bad memory, but because it was now only a memory.

Zuko didn’t really know what to say, so he only blurted out, “The first firebenders were dragons,” and then felt immediately stupid.

Toph’s jaw slackened in surprise, her face lighting up briefly. “Dragons? Are there really—”

He cursed himself for his idiocy, and for now having to ruin it for her. “There are no more dragons,” he told her softly. He wanted to say more but didn’t quite know how to continue, how to fill in the blanks.

As if the weight of having been the slayer of the previous Avatar was not enough, his Uncle Iroh had also slain the last of the dragons.

Toph only sighed, slinking to her feet. “Of course.”

“I’m sorry.”

She waved it off, stretching in preparation for resuming training. “It’s fine, let’s just continue.”

They filled another hour progressing through forms before finally he suggested they end with breathing exercises, which was met with less resistance than he had expected. Zuko had hoped to start her there, to emphasize the importance of control and precision, but he had reconsidered it after learning more about her, deciding it best to lead up to it.

It was a failure, regardless; she spent their time fidgeting and unfocused, her breathing out of sync with his, her energy more muddled than before.

They were still at it sometime later when, softly, Toph murmured, "She's upset," and broke him from his concentration.

Zuko puzzled on it only briefly, swinging his eyes about until they eventually found his sister, who stood leaned against one of the columns that made up the eastern side of the arena, her arms crossed over her chest. The rising sun silhouetted behind her made for a frightening visage. She was composed as ever—not a hair out of place—and when at last she strode forward he could see upon her face the usual sinister smile, all of which painted a picture of an Azula who was not at all upset.

Toph thought otherwise, and though Zuko knew Azula better than anyone save for his mother, and maybe Mai, he felt the Avatar’s intuition was more than likely accurate. He wondered at how his sister appeared to Toph beneath the surface, how her heart spoke to the woman’s ears in the way it rattled beneath her ribs. Nothing about Azula betrayed her, save her heartbeat.

Azula’s foul mood was only confirmed for him when she finally decided to speak, drawing to a halt before them, her shadow casting darkness over them where they sat.

“Is she bending fire yet?”

Toph opened her mouth to respond but Zuko beat her to it, ignoring his sister’s remark. “What are you doing here?” he asked her.

“Mother sent me to collect you."

Toph had already stood and she offered out a hand to help Zuko to his feet, which he accepted. He gave a wary look to Azula, who was now smiling, eyes lit up with glee. “Avatar,” she said, the barest hint of charm still hanging onto her voice. “Would you give me the honor of a spar? I’m quite eager to see you earthbend.”

Toph lit up at that, likely all too eager herself to be doing anything but breathing exercises, given how she had been taking to that. She cracked her knuckles, each pop loud like rocks clacking together. “Absolutely,” she agreed, grinning, “Let’s go.”

“Excellent.” Zuko’s stomach sank at their readiness to battle, especially at the simmer beneath Azula’s surface that Toph had so quickly picked up on. If Azula was indeed upset, then she was no doubt going to take her anger out on her opponent. “I will be a far better match than my brother. Unlike Zuzu, I’ve actually seen earthbending before.”

Zuko started to protest her words, because it was not at all true—though she was not likely to know it, he supposed—but ultimately decided it wasn’t worth rising to his sister’s bait. If it surprised the Avatar to hear it, she gave nothing away.

They faced each other from either end of the arena, both eerily focused. Zuko briefly feared for the integrity of the structure they were within, warily eyeing the sleek stone columns, but ultimately decided Toph was wise enough to be careful.

Azula maybe not so much.

The princess moved first, without a moment of hesitation, her footsteps soft as she darted towards the Avatar. Zuko knew his sister well, and he knew without a doubt that she had figured Toph out, that she understood her blindness was not at all the handicap it seemed. Azula kept herself low, poised to throw herself from any coming attack at a moment's notice. The woman easily matched Toph’s keen perception, and she was more than prepared for the earthbender when she finally reacted, launching columns of earth up to trip up her path and slow her down.

Her feet, whose footfalls before had been so careful and silent, erupted into jets of flame that spilled sparks as she, instead of dodging to the side of the columns rising in front of her, kicked herself into the air off of them and launched herself forward. Her body twisted and she came down with a sweeping kick that spilled fire in a vicious arc towards the Avatar.

Zuko was surprised to see that Toph made no attempt at a proper dodge, choosing to hold her ground. With Azula in the air, she had the literal upper hand, but Zuko imagined Toph could feel her heat, could do the math in her mind of where the princess was going to be, could probably hear the cackle of her fire.

Toph blocked the attack with a barrage of small rocks broken down from the ground beneath her feet, sending them flying in a neat wave with a swift movement of her arms. It was a smart move, preventing Azula—who had now proved herself to be incredibly adept in the air—from finding another solid surface to kick off of. At the same time, Toph took the opportunity to duck forward, rearranging her position in relation to her opponent such that now she was the one on the offense, poised to strike the moment Azula landed, which she did with significant effort.

Having been caught as she had, the other woman was now cornered, though her footing was still sure. It had become almost immediately obvious to Zuko that Azula had Toph on speed, despite the decisiveness of the Avatar’s movements. However, even now on the defensive, Azula was unphased. Although her landing had been less than sure, she was still light on her feet and quick to keep moving, another weakness of Toph's she had picked up on with ease.

Azula swung her leg forward, flinging more flames upward and forcing Toph back a bit. In the interim, Azula finally found the means to get the upper hand once more, yet again moving into the air via a violent burst of flame which she aimed forcefully downward, scattering dust and ash and small bits of rocks about. The result, though not in any way a hindrance to Toph’s sight, still caught her off guard, forcing her to throw her arms up in front of her to stop the bulk of the debris sent flying her way—it was the very same movement she had made the night of the attack, when she had halted the violent spray of metal. Still, the concussive force of the blast was near enough to throw her off her feet, and Zuko didn’t miss that the earth came up to wrap up and around her ankles to brace her in place.

Azula landed with urgency, which translated into an increase in her speed as she did not so much as break for a moment, instead throwing herself into a sprint whose speed was boosted by a continuous stream of fire.

For nearly a minute the two traded blows, Toph darting across the now shattered stone underneath her, throwing up slab after slab to block burst after burst of flame. Zuko had sparred often enough with his sister to tell that she was attempting to move in close enough to bring them into hand to hand combat, and though he could tell Toph had sharp combat skills, he was less than confident that they extended to direct hand to hand fighting.

Azula got the edge in the end, finding her way back into the air while Toph was distracted by her flames, and a well aimed burst sent the woman finally off her feet. The Avatar managed to snag a hand into the ground to catch herself, sliding to a halt, an effort which left her panting.

The princess was not unaffected either, her own breaths coming in short pants from the veracity of their fighting. She was grinning now, her hunger sated. Zuko stood, knowing she was officially bored, even as Toph straightened up, ready to keep going.

“Disappointing,” Azula drawled, “You need to be faster.”

She didn’t allow time for Toph to respond, instead waving off her protest and turning on her heel with an annoyed grunt. “Come along, mother’s waiting.”

* * *

Toph took one step into proximity of Ursa and at once knew why it was that Azula’s heart had earlier beat so angry in her chest. She was not unfamiliar with family squabbles, particularly of the mother and daughter sort—Toph’s own relationship with her mother was one incredibly strained as well—and Ursa’s heart, at the sight of her daughter, was an angry thump.

It didn’t last long, her gaze traveling from her daughter to settle onto her instead. Toph was composed after her fight with Azula, though it had taken considerable effort to calm her frustrations. She had slept poorly, had spent her morning growing increasingly uncertain about her firebending potential, and her bout with the princess had left an especially sour taste in her mouth.

Now, it seemed almost turned on its head, given the context of Azula’s lashing out. Toph could relate, and it frustrated her all the more. She could imagine her own mother too easily, the soft sound of her voice as she uttered equally soft criticisms— _ sit straighter, smile more _ . It was too easy to transpose Ursa onto her.

Zuko, who sat tensely beside her, was not ignorant of the fact that something had happened between his mother and sister. It seemed, however, that he was accustomed to it, because he did an excellent job of pretending nothing was going on.

The plan for the meeting had been to debrief properly about the attack two nights prior and, now sat around a large table, Toph had access to the collection of debris that had been salvaged from the wreckage left behind by the explosion. She had already claimed a piece, running her fingers over what was clearly a remnant of the outer shell. Before, she had not been able to place the material, though she knew it to be earthen in nature given the ease she was able to bend it. Now, caressing it in her hand, she knew exactly what it was.

“Ceramic.”

Zuko, too, had picked up a fragment, this one a much smaller piece, almost indistinguishable from a rock. She held out her hand and he placed it in it, then she set about gathering a few more pieces. There were not nearly enough to properly reconstruct even one of the bombs, and she only had her memory to go on, but she held them all in her hands and worked them with her bending until they came together into a miniature replica, roughly the shape of her own small palm.

They were circular in shape, remnant of discs, but it was the middle of the device that was muddled in her mind, left hollow by intent in this duplicate. She had left the metal shards lining the inside scattered where they lay on the table, but they didn’t bother her any less. Ursa seemed to come to the conclusion sooner than her, but it was Azula that vocalized it.

“This metal inside,” she held a shard up, turning it back and forth between her fingers. “This was a blade.” Now, it was a twisted piece of wreckage, sharper and more lethal than it would have been as a simple blade. “This was made for maximum damage.”

Toph’s stomach sank as she passed her small replica to Ursa for the woman to examine. “I do not believe this attack was intended only for you and my son,” the woman said, and her confession did not miss Toph at all. She sucked in a sharp breath at the proper acknowledgement that the circumstances of the attack were indeed related to her arrival, but it seemed the truth was worse. “I believe Ukano intended to use these explosions in the ballroom to attack the crowd.”

Dozens of people had been present that night, and Toph remembered that well because she had been introduced to almost every one of them, and she felt sick now thinking on how violent the explosion had been, even with her holding back the brunt of it and having been a considerable distance away.

The news shocked Azula, whose heart gave a sudden extra thump in agitation. “Ukano is a coward, but even he—”

Ursa interrupted her sharply, which only angered her daughter more. “I have been in correspondence with his wife, Michi, and—”

Azula snarled, “Oh, and  _ her _ opinion is suddenly important?”

“ _ Azula! _ ” Ursa’s tone quieted the room, and Azula’s hands clenched into fists where they were tucked out of view beneath the table.

“The explosion,” Zuko said suddenly, drawing them back, and even Toph swung her head his way, relieved at his intervention. “You think this was meant to be a mass casualty attack, so why didn’t he go through with that?”

Toph frowned, recalling the way the man had seemed almost relieved to stumble upon the two of them, and something about him in that moment had been off. “Well, he found Zuko and I alone on the balcony, so if we were already among the intended targets—”

Azula scoffed. “He couldn’t go through with it, so this was second best?” Toph wondered if Azula had also been among the targets, only to remember that Azula had spent the evening with the man’s daughter—Mai, if she remembered correctly.

There was something else though that nagged at Toph far more than the man’s intentions, even now knowing the details. She gestured for her replica back, passing it back and forth in her hands for a moment. “How did they get all of that in here?”

“What do you mean?”

She found it difficult to articulate, so she set the object down to reach for one of the shards to show them instead. Carefully, so as not to slice herself open, she ran her fingers over it until it was bent back into some semblance of what it once had been: a small, thin blade. It was difficult to approximate how many had been inside of the bomb originally, especially given the carnage it now lay in in front of her, but by her estimation— “To fit these,” she gestured with her makeshift blade, held carefully between her thumb and fore finger, “inside of that, is not easy work, even accounting for it’s real size.” She continued to play with the metal, a second thought forming. “And this is highly refined metal.”

Zuko considered it for a moment. “Ukano was a wealthy man,” he told her, “If I recall correctly, he owned several factories.”

That explained the resources but not— “This is precarious,” she tried to clarify, “I mean, to begin with there must have been an inner chamber that held, well, whatever it is that caused this type of explosion.”

“I am already looking into it,” Ursa assured her, “Among Ukano’s many properties are several mines. I have reason to believe he sourced this explosive powder from there.”

“So, what ignited it?”

Toph had already partially figured that out. “It whistled.” It had soared through the air with ease, and the noise that had accompanied it had grown louder as it’s velocity slowed. “And I suppose it makes sense, given its shape, that there would be an ignition triggered by momentum.” Again, she tried to piece it back together in her mind, the way the inner chamber spiraled, the way the blades would have been tucked inside, following that spiral. “It just seems too complex.”

Azula was immediately offended. “We are the most technologically advanced Nation in the world, of course it seems complex to you.”

Toph ignored her, but she also could not deny that she was rather unfamiliar with technology outside of her own corner of the world. She wasn’t entirely certain if it warranted embarrassment, so she forged ahead. “So was he actually acting alone?”

It quieted them again, and this time Ursa was able to steer the conversation. “The network of resources he had to work with suggests he could have been acting alone, but his intent—Ukano was not a man capable of orchestrating something of this magnitude. And an attack like this, however it was originally intended, carried a message.”

It was a message they would have to figure out on their own.

* * *

Mai was still where Azula had left her, only now she was on the floor, books spread around her in various states of disarray. Azula looked at their pages as she approached, fully aware some of them belonged to her mother. Ursa had always been fond of books—Azula had grown to secretly enjoy being read to from them when she was young, had loved to sit by her mother's side as she taught her the big words and explained the beautiful images in them. Now they were a distant memory of someone she had once been before the first time her mother, in a fit, had decried her a monster. 

Had the woman used these very same books when making the poison she had given Azulon?

She could close her eyes and picture it: the Fire Lord, his old hands cupped around a steaming hot teacup, surprisingly strong and steady for his age, with conversation on his lips and more trust for her than she deserved.

The very same poison nearly forced upon her by—

_ "You don't even remember, do you?!"  _ She swallowed the voice down, but her father's crazed laughter was harder to push from her mind.

She remembered enough.

"Azula?"

She yanked her eyes from a page full of sketches of leaves, of which at least one was familiar—a leaf from a tree common in the north, whose color was vibrant and firey in midsummer, whose rare blossoms were a culinary delicacy. She had eaten one once, on a visit to Mai, and detested it's sickly sweet taste. 

Mai's eyes, when Azula met them, were as heavy as the day before, bags forming from focusing so long on what she was doing, pouring over page after page of small letters and intricate drawings, trying to find a cure for a poison she had created entirely by accident, a last ditch effort to save the dying old Fire Lord.

Ursa had dropped the books off for her not long after Azula's fight with the woman, and she wondered if Mai could tell something had happened between the two of them. She especially wondered if Mai knew it was about her.

Carefully, she stepped over to her where the other woman sat, a blanket folded and spread beneath her to separate her body from the sap of cold from the stone ground. Azula felt a bit of envy at the sight of her, draped in comfortable robes with her hair down, cozy amongst the blankets. 

As in all things, Mai was still extremely organized, and even her books were stacked neatly, with their bindings flush. The spread of the books left open about her was intentional and careful, all of them within easy reach, and Azula watched as she leaned briefly forward to flip a page before returning her attention to her, mouth now slipping into a frown of concern at Azula’s hesitance at the sight of her.

Azula gave her the best imitation of a smile she could muster navigating over to her to briefly clasp her hand. 

“How did it go?” the woman asked, and Azula sighed, pulling away and turning her back to Mai so she would not see her face.

“Our mothers have been talking,” Azula told her, working at the straps of her armor and waving Mai away as she started to stand, refusing her assistance.

Mai sighed. “My mother left a few weeks ago,” she said quietly. “With Tomtom, to go stay with my aunt in the islands.”

Azula was wound up. She bit her lip and took a slow breath. “You told me you didn’t know anything,” she said, tone careful, though it was a struggle to keep it so.

“Azula, after my mom left, I hardly saw my father at all,” her voice was tight, but Azula still couldn’t be sure whether there was truth in her words. “Even before that, he’d been distant.”

_ “You’ve been visiting your father again, haven’t you?”  _ Her own mother's words rang in her ear, and she wondered if the reality was maybe worse, that Mai had looked the other way out of love for her father.

Azula grit her teeth, continuing at her armor, letting it fall messily to the floor on her way to the bath chamber. Within her was still a pent up anger from her fight, and to be faced now with so many of the reasons was overwhelming—Mai, her father, the poison, the attack.

But Azula felt in her gut that Mai was trustworthy, that this woman who held her heart would not be the first in line to betray her. Had Ukano counted on Azula sweeping Mai away to keep her out of harm’s way?

Despite her attempts to hide from Mai that she was unhappy, the woman picked up on it anyway. Carefully, so as not to disturb her neat piles, she got to her feet and approached, curling a gentle hand around her upper arm to stop her before she disappeared into the next room. "Tell me what happened?" she asked softly, and Azula had to resist the urge to yank herself away and shut herself off.

"My mother still doesn't trust you," she finally told her, cutting straight to the point.

Mai murmured a soft "oh," her hand falling away from Azula, who turned at last to face her. There on her face was a twist of guilt, her brows pinched, her mouth a sharp frown, her eyes skittish. After a moment she finally met Azula's gaze, gold on gold.

"Do you trust me, Azula?" she asked, her tone even.

That was the heart of it all. Azula trusted no one. "Of course," she said, and it was easier to lie having said what she'd said, having asserted it was her mother that was the real source. She smiled, large and wide, and reached forward to catch a lock of Mai's hair, curling it around a finger. "I was going to take a bath," she told her, nodding her head in the direction of her bath chamber. "Join me?"

Mai ducked her head to hide her blush, but agreed, taking Azula's offered hand. "I could use a break," she admitted. “What about the rest of your meetings today, though?”

Azula curled her lip, annoyed at the reminder of her messy day. “They will manage without me,” she drawled. It was a subtle, passive move against her mother to skip the rest of the day and instead spend it with Mai. She could imagine the extra frustration it would set upon her already burdensome week.

Quietly, she reminded herself of the true purpose of her attendance, of the placement of her by her mother’s side: Ursa was one of the five councillors to the Fire Lord—it was tradition to have a member of the royal family amongst them, and a sage, and a general—and one day she would be two of those, and she was being groomed for that purpose, to sit by the side of—

Zuko was the Crown Prince.

Zuko would be her Fire Lord.

Azula caught Mai’s wirst, pulling gently at her, and finally, she relented with a soft, amused noise, and it was worth skipping all of her meetings to make Mai feel even a bit better, and it was a thought that she was surprised came to her so quickly and made her stomach warm.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've officially updated the tags and this story will not be Toph/Zuko after all.


	5. An Unfortunate Turn

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is the shortest so far, but if anything that is because the following few chapters are going to be quite long. Especially the next one, which may also have to be broken into two parts. We'll see.

Despite her upbringing, Toph was not a sit still and listen kind of person. However, when in battle, bare feet against her element, her very existence in sync with the world around her, she could stay still forever, her soul moving for her, thrumming in time with her breaths. She tried to think of it that way as she sat cross-legged next to the prince and attempted to mirror the calm he exuded. Zuko had said something about inner peace being the key to strong firebending, and it had plagued her ever since.

She was the Avatar. Inner peace should have come easy to her but it did not. Her restless nights were now part and parcel a product of a growing inner turmoil she couldn't quite place. Toph had woken with angry words echoing in her ears, but when she tried to remember what they were they slipped away.

Now Zuko preached inner peace as if he were a sage, but given the last few days she found it difficult to believe he was somehow at peace internally.

"Your sister is very intense," Toph said suddenly, breaking the silence at last. She was still thinking of their brief spar, but more than that about the princess' sharp tongue and the hint of maliciousness that seemed to accompany her demeanor. "Do you think she was right? That I need to be faster?"

Azula's firebending had been a sharp contrast to Zuko's. She was faster, yes, and though Toph would never say as much to Zuko aloud, she felt certain Azula was also a superior bender to Zuko. A prodigy in her art, just as Toph was with hers.

Toph lurched to her feet, rolling on her heels, thinking of Azula and her energy. Zuko was calm and steady, but Azula's spirit had been on fire. Why could her own not light up in such a way?

Zuko considered her words. "Azula can be cruel and blunt," he explained, "But she means well. I think perhaps she was onto something, certainly. You make up for it in timing, I feel, so don’t take it too much to heart."

Toph swung around, throwing her leg out in a firebending move that mirrored one performed by Azula earlier that day, only not nearly as flawless. “I guess that will come from more practice.”

"Do you have experience with hand to hand combat?" he asked, and it clicked something into place before about Azula that she hadn't quite been able to put her finger on before. "My sister is strong in close proximity.” The princess had been working her way closer to Toph during their entire battle. It sat hard with her that someone had picked up on a weakness so quickly, and had additionally been so eager to exploit it. Leaving the ground, moving constantly with the lightest of steps possible, getting into a range that put Toph directly at a disadvantage.

“She seems strong in everything,” Toph cut in dryly, and Zuko chuckled. She had not directly answered his question, but doing so said enough. She had very little true melee experience, if only because no one could ever get close enough to her to force it.

“Please,” he replied, “Do not flatter her too much. She’s only human.”

Yet her fire had burned so bright Toph still felt it’s presence.

“I’m hungry,” she declared suddenly, deciding it was time to change the subject. It was growing late, and she ached from moving repetitively through unfamiliar forms and was particularly eager to call it an end for the day. The heat of the sun had grown more comfortable, and the hint of the cool night air blowing through the open courtyard signalled the arrival of dusk. Zuko seemed to agree, so she pressed the subject. “And then we can call it a night?”

“Absolutely,” he agreed. “So we can have an early start again tomorrow.” She groaned loudly, and he laughed, leading her out and down into a neatly cobbled alley, which then led them to the streets of Caldera City. They crossed paths with Lian, who was waiting for them, leaned against a building at the mouth of the alley, and the woman fell into pace some ways behind them, ever reminding Toph of her presence, though Zuko seemed unbothered. She knew he and the rest of the royal family had their own people that kept a watchful eye out, an entire platoon of Imperial Guards, who kept better distance and blended in far more readily to the world around them, and often made themselves far more appropriately scarce.

She was stuck with Lian. 

They were very near to the palace in the training spot Zuko had secured them, but secluded enough away that it was still a bit of a walk, which they made mostly in silence.

The large walls surrounding the palace were massive but had nothing on even the smaller of the walls of Ba Sing Se. Still, they offered an intimidating defense, and she could tell that Zuko relaxed ever so slightly once they'd crossed that barrier.

"She was wrong by the way," Zuko said suddenly.

"Who?"

"Azula, I mean," he clarified. "I have seen earthbending before."

Toph thought of her first experience with firebenders, how hot and harsh the heat had been the first time she'd felt it summoned by human hands and brought to life.

Zuko continued at her silence. "I once trained for several summers under the master swordsman Piandoa. He had another student as well, a boy from the colonies, who was an earthbender."

His words had so much meaning, a passing reminder of the war: an earthbender from the colonies, a boy likely displaced during the withdrawal of the Fire Nation from the Earth Kingdom, an earthbender in a country of fire and heat. Like herself.

Toph knew little of the colonies. The withdrawal of the Fire Nation had been bridled with conflict and the fallout from it had trickled out into the interior of the country: refugees, who previously had been fleeing the war, had begun to flee economically stricken regions in hopes of a better life within the walls of the lower ring of Ba Sing Se.

She wondered at the events that led an earthbender from the colonies to seek training in swordsmanship in such a foreign world. It made her wonder all the more how it was that Azula, too, had encountered earthbending.

Zuko spoke again, his words stumbling the slightest bit, and Toph realized with mild embarrassment that she had followed his statement up with silence. “Your bending is far different than his, however.”

Toph laughed, if only to break up the awkwardness her extended bouts of silence were bringing on, her mind elsewhere, back on the princess. “Your sister, I noticed, bends very differently than you. I supposed every form has it’s variations.”

“True,” he said, but she could tell it bothered him that she had mentioned Azula again at all. “Perhaps she can join us in your training, when things settle down.” He sounded resigned.

She snorted at the suggestion things might calm down, and Zuko sighed out his amusement as well, leading them into the palace. She barely noticed as he differed from their typical route, heading straight down the large hall leading into the throne room, rather than down the adjoining corridor which led them to the grand stairway leading to the upper floors—a shortcut, she realized idly. She raised her head from where it had been hanging, startled as Zuko’s body seemed to loom taller and stockier as they stepped through the large doors, an angry burn of heat radiating outwards from him—for the briefest of moments, he was someone else, someone who bore the name of a friend and a betrayer and—

The room grew hot with a rush of fire. Her ears sang with the noise, her senses burned with the roar of the barrage, and… _it struck her in the chest, like a fist slammed into her heart: never had fire been used against her so brutally, with such anger and intent, and from a friend, from a man he called brother, who turned traitorous eyes his way and cursed him for his place in this world, each of them two people with fates neither could control_ —

“Toph?”

Her body trembled against her will and she took an unsteady step into Zuko’s waiting hands, and he helped to keep her upright until the moment passed. Why was she remembering this, why had she been in the throne room of—

Zuko’s voice cracked, and it was only then she realized he was shaken. For a brief, stomach dropping moment she thought he had been there too, that he had fallen backwards in time alongside her, but then he found his words. “Are you alright?” he asked softly, his concern outweighing the obvious curiosity and confusion.

She nodded, but a word caught on her tongue, and she turned over the syllables, miming what had left her in her lapse. She choked on it, refusing to allow it to escape her again. _Sozin, Sozin, Sozin_ —

“You have been here before, in the throne room I mean.” She thought it to be a question, at first, then he followed it up, “Do you ever remember your past lives?” even though he knew that answer now. She stepped away from him, letting the distance give her a moment to collect herself.

The large, empty room spilled out around them, it’s silence deafening and heavy. His question almost echoed, but not for long. He fumbled an apology, heart racing. “I’m sorry,” he rushed out quickly, “That was too forward of me—”

Toph struggled to find what to say, not because of its forwardness but because she wanted to pour it out to him, to let the growing apprehension within her escape, because then maybe she could find the means to articulate her increasingly complicated feelings about who she was.

“No,” she said, “It’s fine.” She chewed at her lip for a second, before continuing, “You’re right. I have been here before. I remember some.”

Zuko cleared his throat. “Avatar Roku was a close friend of Fire Lord Sozin. I believe he visited the palace often.”

Roku. The last Avatar of the Fire Nation.

Toph had seldom ever thought of anyone before Hama, who she had heard the most about—although not for the better. Before Hama had been the nameless, faceless airbender, and then before that, before the world had been thrown into the chaos of war, there had been Avatar Roku, born a firebender. None of those people were _her,_ and even inhabiting the body of a memory did nothing more than trap her in a mind not her own.

If Toph died, there would be another Fire Nation Avatar. She had not turned her thoughts to that since her trip over, when the destination could have been death and she would have preferred it to the sea sickness, a silly thought that never seemed possible to come to fruition in an untimely manner. Now, she stood in a room with the Crown Prince, both of them targets.

She understood now why Ukano and his group, whoever they may be composed of, had sought to kill them both in one go.

Toph drew in a breath and forced a smile, trying to swallow down the growing unease within her. “We can continue the tradition then,” she said. “I will have to visit often.” She put it out there with such ease that it momentarily flustered him. Zuko would be her Fire Lord. “Maybe I can have a special room.”

Zuko laughed, letting the strangeness of the moment finally pass them both. “I am certain that can be arranged,” he told her, leading them on.

* * *

It was late and Azula, for the first time in ages, was blissfully asleep and comfortable and at some semblance of peace. It was broken by loud, urgent knocking at her door.

Mai moved before she did, yanking herself from Azula’s arms in alarm, clearly more awake than Azula had been. Sleep had not come so easy to her.

The door creaked open before she had finished pulling herself upright, and the light from the hall spilled the long, billowy shadow of her mother into her room. What she could see of Ursa’s face was not good. “Come quick,” she beckoned urgently, coming further into the room. “The Fire Lord has just taken a turn.”

She had not come for Azula. She had come for Mai.

Moments later they were at the bed of the Fire Lord, who had indeed taken a terrible turn. His face was flushed with fever and his brow was lined with sweat. The room stunk of strong incense—the head Sage was present, set up over his bed and murmuring prayers—and the Fire Lord himself was unnervingly still save for the rattle of his breath and the slow rise and fall of his chest that accompanied it.

Ursa had sharp eyes fixed on Mai as she ushered the High Sage away and took his place. Mai had her hand clutched in Azula’s own, a gesture not at all missed by her mother. She squeezed it before she departed from her side to join Ursa. Now, the hand that replaced Azula’s was the wrinkled old hand of the Fire Lord as Mai took it and turned it over, looking at his palm and his wrist.

“It’s too late.”

Azula hardly heard her, all of her attention focused on her mother’s face as her partner uttered the damning words declaring the fate of the Fire Lord. He was dying and there was nothing she could do for him, though Azula knew the woman had poured over books and tossed and turned during the brief bit of slumber they’d gotten, haunted by the need to find a cure. Now, her confession was a curse.

Ursa’s eyes were wide, her hands shaking, one of them reaching out to wipe at the man’s brow with a damp cloth. Azula stood in the shadows, ignored, there only by her own insistence, when she could have been in bed. Was she going to witness the death of another Fire Lord? Was this going to become a trend in her life?

She had obstinately refused to leave Mai’s side, and so now she was here watching the woman utter the words no one wanted to hear. “There’s nothing I can do.”

Ursa turned on her, eyes smoldering, a seething rage deep within her that Azula recognized as the same fire Ursa had birthed and stoked within her. “What do you mean?” Her voice was thick as the smoke clinging to the air from the incense, and Mai dropped the Fire Lord’s hand as if stung, bringing her hand to her chest and raking her eyes over the man.

Azula stalked over, coming to stand across from the two of them. “She means he’s going to die, mother,” she snarled. Her words did their job; they turned her mother’s ire her way instead of Mai’s. The woman had not forgotten their fight and the doubt her words had cast over Mai. Now, she all but begged for Mai to fix what she could not.

Mai’s voice cracked when she finally spoke again. “This poison,” she stopped to clear her throat, “It was not intended to kill.” And yet there the old man lay, dying. “I was studying a method to limit bending, and in the process of refining my project, I—” She took a step back, dropping into a chair set near the bed. In the dim lighting of the room, caught in the glow of dying lamplight and the haze of smoke, she looked ghastly. Her hair was still down, and its messiness only made her face look paler. She crossed her arms over one another, holding them close against her stomach. She was the specter that had brought death to the Fire Lord and she knew it. “I should have destroyed it,” she whispered.

Ursa didn't care. She wanted answers and she pressed for them, curling a hand around Mai's shoulder in what Azula could tell was mock sympathy. “Surely there is something,” she said. It sounded like an echo, her voice faint. “Mai, tell me—”

“He got worse so soon because he bent,” she replied. Azula thought of the old man’s fondness for his tea, and she could picture him feeling better, sipping again at his favorite beverage, and bending because he hadn’t in so long. “The poison is attacking his qi paths. His bending sped it up, I’m certain. Right now, it is spreading through his body. Fever is taking over trying to fight it off. Paralysis will set in soon.” Her voice had changed, and now she sounded clinical and calm. She lifted her head to meet Ursa’s eyes. “There is no longer anything I can do. He needs a healer. A waterbender.”

Silence fell suddenly. The Sage had stopped his chanting. Azula had nearly forgotten his presence, his incessant noise easily fading into the background. Now his silence was startling and drew all their eyes. "There is not a waterbender alive who would come near the Fire Lord." _Without killing him_ hung between the lines, and at his intrusion Ursa rounded on him.

"Leave," she ordered and he stared back at her, dumbfounded. Azula remembered her mother's words a few days prior: trust no one. The High Sage opened his mouth to answer but reconsidered, promptly snapping it closed and excusing himself with a bow, beads still clutched in his hands as he stiffly formed the sign of Agni.

"He's right, though," Azula scoffed when the door had finally closed, crossing her arms in annoyance. "Uncle killed their Avatar. No waterbender would save his life."

For a long while Ursa was quiet. Azula met Mai's eyes across the dying man between them, a tension growing in the air as the silence stretched on. "How long does he have?" she asked at last.

Mai stood. "If we can keep his fever down, there is a chance he can live a few more weeks." Extend his suffering at the expense of buying them time to decide the best course of action. "At most."

Azula briefly wondered how Mai had tested her eventual poison; for how long had she poured over texts and hunted for the right materials for her project only to realize it was lethal? Mai had often confessed her boredom and disdain for being trapped up north with her family, and Azula imagined being productive in such a way, with such an immensely difficult and technical hobby, had brought her some semblance of joy.

How quickly that had been dashed for her.

* * *

There was a voice in her head, an angry mess of noise that crashed against her like a wave, the harsh falsetto of an older woman cursing her. Gnarled hands tore at her, holding her fast and pulling her down. Above her was the burn of heat, scorching like a sun, and she reached for it as she was pulled beneath ice cold waves as if it could save her.

Just like that, the warmth was gone.

The voice shook her and suffocated her and when she opened her mouth to cry out it filled with water.

Toph awoke abruptly, gasping for air, hands fisting in the blankets. Her room was chilly, as she had discovered the case to be all throughout the palace late at night, but it seemed colder now than ever before. She curled in on herself, clutching more tightly at the blankets, desperate to nurse some warmth back to life, trying in vain to cling to the words already dying in her ears, to hold on to the sound of that voice—

And she knew that voice, she _knew_ that voice. Toph flew upright, heart pounding faster once more, trembling in the realization.

That voice was hers, only—

That voice was Hama’s.


	6. Ursa Alone, Part 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I ended up deciding to split this chapter up. I have been dying to get to this point in the story, and I hope you all enjoy this and the next chapter. There is so much left to come. After Ursa Alone prt 2, the story will be shifting back more heavily to Toph and Zuko for a while, so don't worry :) They're coming.

Azula was angry and it was not something Ursa was unfamiliar with. Her daughter had taken as much after her father as after herself, and nursing tempers was something Ursa had become quite skilled at. Already, Azula seethed to have been dragged from her slumber so abruptly, and at the suggestion Mai stay without her she became visibly bristled.

Ursa wanted Mai away from Azula, if only to have the girl laid bare in front of her, without the influence of her daughter. She held firm. "You are welcome to wait outside," she said. "I will not be long."

Azula met Mai's eyes and huffed, turning on her heel with a snarled out, "Fine," and heading for the exit.

The opening of the door stirred the gathered smoke of the incense, spilling in fresh air. Ursa took a breath, and then rounded on Mai, who stood beneath her gaze as if the breath had been struck from her.

Ursa could still remember when Azula had first come to her, sheepish in a way more akin to Zuko —and perhaps that was how she had learned to wear the face—and asked after her books, because Mai had become interested in herbalism and nature and the sciences. Ursa, in her private quarters, had shelves and shelves of tomes—filled with wealths of knowledge about the world, ranging from the ancient to the new, all of them irreplaceable and hers alone—and Azula remembered them because there had once been a time when Ursa delighted in sharing them with her children.

Azula had been six years old when she’d grabbed a fistfull of pages and set ablaze, in anger, one of Ursa’s most prized books, one of only a few in her collection she had brought from home, much of the rest of them token gifts from Ozai and Azulon, and even some of them from Iroh, brought back from his travels. It had been handed down to her from her mother’s line since before even the time of Avatar Roku, whose wife had gone to great lengths to ensure its survival by including it among the few items she had been able to secure before the inevitable eruption that split Ursa’s family into what it now was.

That book that had survived a volcano had been made into ashes at the beck of Azula’s temper.

But her daughter had come to her and advocated for Mai, who would treat her books well, because Mai had developed a passing passion for nature, not for its beauty but for its science, for the challenge of understanding its complexity. What, for Ursa, had been a hobby picked up from her mother, who had been the physician of the small town in the north she had once called home, and touted like a silly, passing fancy by the likes of Ozai, had been nursed within Mai by her daughter, until the chain of events passed which now led Iroh to lay dying.

Ursa, truthfully, did not know poisons. She could construct remedies for fevers, for aches of many kinds, for the fragility of the mind—but she knew only one lethal poison, and it had been one lost to the pages of the book burned at her daughter's hand, the knowledge left only now to her memory, the very poison she had created and slipped into the tea of Azulon.

But Mai had a skill set she did not, and time and dedication Ursa had long ago lost. She had crafted something wicked, for the sake of curiosity, ignorant to how truly terrible an attack on something so tied to life force as bending might be.

“Tell me,” she said, and Mai, exhausted, dropped back into her chair. “Can you make this again?”

She shook her head. “I burned all of my notes.”

Ursa pressed the matter. “But can you make it again?" This time, it was clearer.

Mai refused to look at her, lips pressed into a tight line. Finally, she replied, "I memorized it, yes." There was the truth, and neither of them could pretend not to understand the subtext of her words. She had memorized it, taking care to remember the details, so that her work would not be lost forever.

Ursa had memorized her poison the first time Ozai had struck her, though somewhere deep down she had thought she'd never truly use it. But when the time came, it was what had allowed her to have an upper hand, however briefly that had lasted.

For Mai, it was also something she wished to have in her arsenal should it ever become necessary, but hers was a slow, torturous death. Azulon, the monstrous namesake of her daughter, had been allowed to pass peacefully in his sleep, while Iroh was cursed to suffer unreasonably.

She wanted to grab Mai by the shoulders and scream her frustrations. Had Azula motivated her to take such a path?

Before she had been thankful for the blessing of Mai's presence in her daughter's life. The girl brought Azula a happiness not born of selfishness, a love Ursa had never given her enough of to satisfy her, and Azula had become a better person with her influence. It hurt to even think that perhaps the reverse had been true.

Ursa swallowed the thought away. She had spent many restless nights worrying about Azula, trying to place her in the timeline of the Fire Lord’s poisoning and Ukano’s attack and the steady leak of information that appeared to be spilling continuously out from the walls of the palace.

Rumors of Iroh’s poisoning had begun to circulate in the north, stirring up the already growing unrest in the area at the death of the Governor. Ukano had held power through his position and his wealth, and he was not an unpopular figure, his family having been established there for generations, his factories and mines providing secure jobs. The end of the war had created an economic nosedive; hundreds of thousands of soldiers returning home —jobless, without strong support networks waiting for them, their lives having forever been  _ war _ —had overwhelmed the nation, the motherland having spent the last hundred years pouring money into its military instead of its people.

Ukano had successfully maneuvered himself into the ideal position to profit from the fallout, and had used his substantial wealth to develop the land, providing homes in new districts so that he might profit off their rent, factories to hire the jobless so that he might profit off their labor, and mines so that he could control the entire chain of manufacturing.

His involvement in an attack on the royal family and his subsequent mysterious death so shortly afterwards was being taken as a sign. It remained to be seen which direction things might go. It was not only unlike Ukano, but also entirely unexpected; Ukano had benefited greatly from the end of the war and the fall of Ozai.

It only increased the unease growing within her that something terrible was on the horizon.

“Mai,” Ursa murmured at last. The chambers were eerily quiet, and Mai yanked her head up to look at Ursa at the sound of her name, almost startled. The girl had probably had about as much sleep in the last few days as Ursa herself, and the coming weeks would only weigh on them both all the more. Hope would slip away with each passing day until there was no way forward. “When did the poison go missing?”

“I don’t know,” Mai croaked out.

“Did you know it was gone?”

It gave her pause, but her voice was firm when she answered with a very decisive, “No.”

Ursa stared her down and Mai stared back, unwavering.

Her daughter had learned her temper and her madness and her viciousness from her father, but Azula’s sharp tongue, her knack for lying, her uncanny ability to read those around her as if reading their souls—that she had taken from Ursa.

“You can go,” Ursa told her, and Mai scrambled up, smoothing the wrinkles and correcting the untidiness of her robe as she went as if trying to shed the atmosphere of the room that lingered on her, even as she hurried to the door and disturbed, again, the smoke of the incense, which now had become a fading haze that almost shimmered in the flickering light of the dim lamps still burning.

She moved as if Ursa might change her mind at any second, and it was in the moment her hand landed upon the door that Ursa did, indeed, decide to stop her. “I will come retrieve you tomorrow. Please be prepared.”

Mai nodded without looking back, then fled through the door.

Once it had clicked closed Ursa dropped into the chair Mai had only just vacated, raking a hand across her face and letting out a frustrated, exhausted sigh.

Mai was lying.

* * *

_ “I have a poison.” Ursa did not delude herself into thinking that they were wise words to whisper, or that the accompanying plan, as she laid it out for him, was anything but treasonous. It would not end well and the cost would be high, but if it would save her son and give him a fighting chance— _

_ Ozai considered her words and her plan, catching her hand in his own, a foreign gesture which made her stomach sink. He was gentle, allowing his thumb to rub gently across her knuckles. Ursa shuddered, wrenching herself away. “I will make you a deal, dear wife,” he told her, grinning wildly. “To ensure you never use this against me, this poison you have _ — _ you will make enough for all of us. And I will look after them for you.” _

_ Her head spun and she stepped back, reeling at his intent. _

_ He followed, grinning wider. “For Azulon. For you and that wretched child you call a son,” Ursa finally broke eye contact, unable to stand the way in which he looked upon her, now backed against a wall. “Even for dear Azula.” _

_ He grabbed her by the shoulders, face mad. “Tomorrow you will wake up the wife of a Fire Lord, and you will obey me and stand by my side.” He caught her chin roughly, digging his sharp fingers into her jaw and forcing her to look at him and meet his eyes. Tears burned in her eyes and he took delight at the sight of them, laughing and finally releasing her with a hard push, sending her hitting the wall behind her. She stayed against it, chest heaving, the wall now her only means of staying upright. “Do you understand? We are in this together.” _

* * *

In the kitchens in the bowels of the palace it was particularly cold at night, but most especially in the earliest of the morning hours, just before dawn, when the dark corners had gone so long without knowing warmth that they clung to the chill like frost might on dewy leaves. Her bare feet stirred to life dust and crumbs, and the coolness of the earth beneath her raised goosebumps up her legs. All around it was eerily quiet and in the air hung an atmosphere that mirrored the unnerving silence in the first moments of waking, when all around the world was still a distant blur and one struggled to remember who and where and why they were.

It was scarcely an hour before sunrise and the earliest of the kitchen staff to arrive for the day were trickling in, and among them was the boy she'd come for.

She found him in a room adjourning the main kitchen, stood at a large counter, his dark hands powdered with flour as he worked the first of the morning’s bread. He looked up as she entered, visibly alarmed, his hands halting their steady knead.

His dough stickied hands clumsily formed the sign of Agni as he bowed his head to her in greeting, his words leaving him in a stammer. 

She returned his greeting, placating his nervousness with a gentle smile. She swept into the room, nearing him and the fire, whose roar was loud enough she could be guaranteed of privacy in her conversation from any of the groggy staff who might wander in.

“I need a favor from you,” she told him, cutting straight to the point.

Ursa knew who the boy really was, and his purpose working in the palace, but his presence was not a threat. She had personally overseen the hiring of all of the palace staff, had vetted each individual thoroughly and ensured they were sufficiently paid for their work and their loyalty. And among them she had her own network of select trusted individuals, who reported to her the happenings of every corner of the palace.

She knew all that went on, and yet —

Someone had slipped through, not once but twice.  There was not a soul who had an answer, not even the Fire Lord himself, as to when he had been poisoned, how soon it had been before he had taken ill. And now he lay dying.

Had it been bribery? Blackmail? Malice?

And then there was Ukano, one of only a few people who might have had the answers, and he had been taken at the ideal time: herself and Azula and the important members of the cabinet in a meeting, in the mid-morning shift change that happened daily like clockwork but had never before left such a penetrable gap in time. The dungeons of the palace were not often used anymore, given the nature of times of peace and the nearby prison installed on the far side of the mountain from Harbor City, which was by far a safer and fitter location for the long-term holding of the Nation’s worst. Someone knew to take advantage of that, knew that he would be taken into the depths of the palace and furthest from anything but guards and far from the eyes of anyone else who may have seen something.

Beneath her very eyes the order she had worked so hard to establish was fracturing.

The shaken boy in front of her was neither a trusted individual or a traitor, but instead a carefully planted, but ultimately harmless, member of the Southern Water Tribe. He had come with a strong recommendation from a close source and ally, and his papers had been in excellent order —his parentage, his hometown, his schooling—all of them had painted the image of a Fire Nation citizen whose skill set befit the desired qualifications of the position.

His first message sent back upon his arrival in Harbor City had not been missed, and had unraveled his too-clean history. He made far more careful work of his spying upon beginning his time there, and she found having him under her own observation beneficial enough to allow the snippets of information about the goings on of the nation to be trickled back to his homeland.

The Fire Nation no longer had ill will towards the water tribes. Information she allowed to reach him, in his minimal, removed role working in the kitchens, did very little harm in the long run. And now she had an upper hand. She controlled the narrative.

She knew by now that the news of the Fire Lord’s illness had circulated sometime ago, and now that information was beset by the rumor of his poisoning, a story now uncontainable. If it did not reach the Southern Water Tribe through this boy before her then it would have reached them by another means.

His wide eyes met hers, and the understanding was loud and clear. He said nothing, waiting for her to continue.

She let her smile fall. “I need you to send a message.”

* * *

_ The very first man hauled before them for treason had met Ursa’s eyes with his own, and with them he had begged: large, gold eyes wide and bloodshot and wet with terror pleaded for her intervention. From his lips he tried to reason with Ozai, pitiful words leaving him so quickly and deliriously he could hardly be understood, but with his eyes he begged Ursa, who sat next to the throne and stared back at him and did nothing as Ozai caught his head in one large hand and fire roared to life. _

_ His words became screams and Ursa clenched her hands tightly together in her lap, powerless. _

_ She knew his eyes. _

_ Only two days prior the man had stood at the palace gates as an imperial guard and slipped into her hand a small, folded note as she passed by. Though his face had been obscured by his helmet, which gleamed menacingly with the way the harsh sunlight caught the curves and sharp points, she knew who he was. He had been a close friend of Lu Ten's and Ursa could still remember him as the eager youth who dreamed of the honor of standing guard as one of the elite benders of the Fire Lord, a boy attached to the hip of Lu Ten, with laughter and warmth and joy in his eyes when he turned them upon his friend. _

_ Lu Ten was dead.  _

_ She had waited, breathless, with the note tucked away in the folds of her robes until she could read it in privacy, some time later. Her hands had trembled as she'd read the words: 'He is coming' written neatly and boldly across the paper. She'd burned it at once, dipping one corner of the thick parchment into the flickering light of a nearby oil lamp, watching as the fire licked away the words and rendered them to ash. _

_ Now, she sat in a room full of people, all of them watching the catalyst of the horror that was to come. Ozai’s top generals stood in proper formation downstage, with their commanders lined up behind them, all of them dressed in their ceremonial armor, which looked especially wicked in the wildness of the light cast from the burning man. Every face was stoney and hard. _

_ The Head Sage was present as well, though his position in the room told Ursa and everyone present where he fell in line with Ozai’s views: the new Fire Lord cared little for tradition and matters of the spirit, tossing aside what he felt to be the foolishness of his father best left to fall out of fashion. He stood cast aside to stage left, where he and his fellow sages clustered in the shadows of the columns spanning the room like tossed aside dolls, their faces ghastly in the light and harshly contrasted by the bright crimson of their robes. Still, the Head Sage held himself well, regally as he had the day he had set alight the pyre of his Fire Lord, but no incense clouded the room and no chanting was to be heard. _

_ The Head Sage would meet the same fate as the man before them just weeks later, when Ozai learned it was he who the information had come from, though Lu Ten's friend had acted on his own in passing a message along to Ursa. _

_ The man’s screams stopped before he was fully dead, his breath snatched from him by the flames. He jerked and twitched in silent agony, a horrific display that set Ozai to grinning wildly, glee in his eyes when he looked briefly back to meet hers, to make sure she was watching. _

_ This was a performance of his might, and though he had gathered his finest to bear witness to it, his intent was clear. This man was to be an example to the rest of them, but most of all to her. The price of treason was horrific and merciless. _

* * *

She ran into the girl leaving the kitchens completely unexpectedly. Jin, the attendant who had accompanied the Avatar, looked already out of place in her Earth Kingdom colors, and she was visibly spooked at crossing paths with Ursa. She nodded her head in respect as she began to pass and Ursa, a thought forming in her mind, stopped her.

"My dear, what was your name again?" she asked, feigning ignorance to put the girl at ease.

Jin’s smile was accompanied by dimples. “Jin, my Lady,” she told her.

Ursa nodded as if it were her first real interaction with the girl. “What brings you out so early?” she asked.

“The Avatar has been rising with the sun for training,” Jin explained, which meant she too was rising with the sun. She seemed freshly awake, though well put together considering. Ursa, by contrast, had gone to great lengths to hide the weariness in her soul —she had carefully brushed the tangles from her hair, pressed powders to her face and beneath her eyes to cloud the blottiness brought on by exhaustion, and had donned a more formal garment for the day, which would be filled with endless political contrivance.

Ursa chuckled. “Are you headed there now?" Her next meeting would be in Caldera City, and if she recalled correctly, Zuko had secured a spot not far from the palace for his training with the Avatar.

Jin shuffled awkwardly under the attention, but remained otherwise unphased. She held herself well, her smile true and eyes sure as they met hers. “I was, yes. They are out in the city.”

“Of course.” Ursa pretended to think on it a moment, matching her smile. “I was heading that way myself, perhaps I can join you?” Ursa was comfortable with being forward, a trait inherent and sometimes necessary in her position of power, and she knew how to navigate her way with it. She had been interested in observing the Avatar and Zuko train, and running into the girl’s attendant was ideal timing. Her meeting would not be for a while yet.

The woman’s smile faltered for only a moment, her nerves briefly slipping through. “Of course,” she agreed. “I am more than happy for the company.”

Ursa fell into step beside her with ease, and even more easily into conversation. At her own suggestion, Jin told Ursa about herself: she had grown up in the countryside in a small hamlet just outside of Ba Sing Se, and had moved to the city as a teenager to seek work, taking up residence with an aunt who lived in the Middle Ring, which she now called home. Every word she said filled Ursa’s ears with details of a corner of the world she had few eyes upon, and she let the girl fill their time until they finally stepped from the palace and into the dim light of dawn.

At the gates to the palace Ursa was surprised to find that the guard accompanying the Avatar had taken up residence against the wall in wait for Jin. The woman, dressed down in a dark green tunic, had situated herself along the shadows of the wall, where one’s eyes were drawn away by the distraction of the sharp light of the rising sun, which had begun to creep across Caldera City, spilling rays of soft light down the neatly cobbled roads. The woman stepped forward and into view when they exited from the gates, unminded by the Imperial Guards who stood at the threshold into the city proper, to whom she had likely become a familiar presence. She turned a sharp frown on Ursa, her pale, round face obscured by the wild fall of her bangs, and then turned and headed down the street.

With the disturbance of the light—her silhouette made inky, her long shadow spilling out behind her—she could almost have been mistaken for the Avatar—her height, the way she held her shoulders, even the color of her hair and the way it fell about her head, pulled into a tight knot at the base of her neck rather than high upon her head.

Jin sighed loudly, pressing a hand over her mouth at the sound in embarrassment, and it drew Ursa from the pause the sight had given her. “That’s Lian,” the attendant explained. “She, uhh—” Jin lingered on the thought, but her eager tongue made the decision for her, “She is not very happy to be here.”

It caught Ursa off guard but for an entirely different reason: though the diplomatic endeavor had not been without substantial catastrophe, the tensions between the nations thus far had not been jarring or particularly difficult to move past, given the time since the end to the war. Some of the Earth Kingdom soldiers had even ventured out into Harbor City to explore and socialize, and the main officials had been welcomed more than warmly into Caldera City, where they were being housed quite comfortably.

It was definitely of interest to her that the Avatar’s guard, who had been creeping around on light feet with sharp eyes—Ursa had seen her observing the crowd during the welcoming festivities rather than at the side of the Avatar, as perhaps she should have been. But more than likely her true purpose was not to protect Toph—who Ursa felt rather strongly was more than equipped to look after herself.

“I  _ love  _ it here, though!” Jin continued, changing the subject back to what Ursa had guided it towards.

The rest of their walk went quickly, their destination not at all far from the palace walls, though tucked away down a small alley that Ursa recognized as a shortcut she’d watched Azula and Zuko scurry down many times on their way to the palace, at the time still young and eager and thrilled at visiting the Fire Lord and their family. Now, she took it the other way, towards where their quarters were before they’d moved into the palace themselves at the Fire Lord’s insistence, scarcely a year before she had partnered with Ozai to take the throne.

The grounds were just as she remembered them, still neatly manicured and maintained by palace staff, and though the sizable compound she called home for nearly a decade now stood empty and unused, its significance still hung in the atmosphere of the property.

“Toph and the Crown Prince are down this path to the left here,” Jin explained, gesturing to the stone walkway whose destination was obscured by the foliage of trees and plants, but beyond which Ursa knew could be found the courtyard in which had been erected a large, semi-enclosed training grounds. Ozai had regularly used it, given it’s privacy and distance from the main home.

They broke apart there, Jin continuing on into the house proper. Lian was nowhere in sight, though Ursa suspected she was not far.

As she had been told, she found her son and Toph sitting in the middle of the long expanse of the training field, cross-legged and meditating in the growing light and heat of the sun.

Toph, it seemed, was aware of her arrival—Ursa could tell in the slight shift of her posture, her shoulders stiffening—but Zuko did not, his eyes closed in concentration. She called out to him as she approached, and his eyes flew open in surprise.

“Mother,” he greeted, climbing to his feet and down the steps leading out to the courtyard. She caught him in a hug, giving him no time to deny it, folding her arms and the heavy sweep of her robes around him briefly. His cheeks went the slightest bit pink, the sheepish look coming upon him that she always reveled in seeing, and she chuckled, taking him in. “What brings you by?” he managed at last. “It’s very early.”

Truthfully, Ursa had hardly seen Zuko since the arrival of the Avatar—save for their harried discussions on what was unfolding—his time having been taken up with her and her own time being filled with constant meetings and various other political commitments. The duties of the Fire Lord did not disappear, and with his absence the burden had been spread across the council, and especially so on Ursa. Zuko had requested she join them for dinner the night before, and even that she had been forced to turn down, her time instead spent with General Zhao, pouring over details of the chaos potentially unfolding up North, discussing how to move forward with the death of Ukano. She had taken her meal hours later, eating the simplest and quickest thing she could have brought to her at such a late hour, much of the staff having left for the night.

She smiled at Zuko, looking from him to Toph who had stood and was coming down to join them. “I was headed to a meeting nearby and thought I would come see you.” The moment her eyes had met Zuko’s and seen how bright they were, she had regretted coming by. The news of Iroh’s worsening had not yet been given to him, and Ursa couldn’t yet bring herself to tell him.

She had time.  _ They  _ had time.

Today, she would let him enjoy himself in blissful ignorance, and then in the morning she would gather them together and she would trouble them with the news. The days to come would not be good, but at least she could hold off on spoiling the one good one they might have left for a while.

Toph was perceptive in a way that never ceased to surprise Ursa, and the girl seemed to have immediately picked up on the fact that something was off. Even as Zuko ran her briefly through the docket of their training routine—cycles of meditating and breath exercises then hours of forms and sparring—the Avatar seemed far more focused on Ursa, lips pressed into a tight line, the line of her shoulders harsher than usual. She seemed to bear an additional exhaustion on top of it, her eyes shadowed, neck stiff, the hint of a sag in her movements.

“I think she will be firebending any day,” Zuko finished, gesturing to Toph, who was startled, who had not been paying attention, having been caught in her own head.

“Hopefully,” she replied easily, but her voice was tight and tired.

Ursa suspected perhaps it bothered her, but she trusted Zuko’s judgement. Azula had been born a prodigy; she had never had to try hard to excel, whereas Zuko had to claw his way to the top, and in so many ways was stronger for it in his bending. Ursa seldom had the time to see him bend, even before the ruination unfolding around them, but every time she witnessed it the warmth of his fire felt almost to contain a peace and calm in it that Azula’s did not.

The light was growing by the moment, the sunrise at last beginning to slip away, and Ursa quickly decided it was time for her to depart, the burdens of her day already beginning to weigh upon her more heavily with the increasing onset of the morning. She caught Zuko’s hands in hers, squeezing them. “I have to go, but tomorrow—” she had to force her voice to stay even— “In the morning, I will send for you.”

Silence fell and lingered, only interrupted as Jin stepped into the courtyard, a large earthen pitcher balanced against her hip, waving in greeting and calling out to them, too far away yet to see that anything was amiss.

“I understand,” Zuko replied, and behind him Toph nodded solemnly.

With one last smile at them, albeit a tight, difficult one to don, she turned and headed for her first appointment.

* * *

General How was a man that reminded her of Iroh with his world-weary demeanor. He was closer in age to Ursa; his dark hair was marked with only the slightest of gray if one were to look carefully for it, but his beard had weathered the world more, the streaks of gray more striking. He was a sensible man with a level head, a wise choice to lead the Earth King’s Council of Five.

Ursa had invited him for morning tea to converse before the first of the day’s meetings, and he was already present when she finally stepped into the private room, sliding closed the wooden door behind her. The room held very little, it’s prominent furnishing the ornately carved low wooden table before which How knelt, and the empty silk cushion awaiting her.

Tea came quickly, an attendant slipping in and out quietly.

“I am sure by now you have heard the rumors,” Ursa began, blowing gently upon her tea.

How nodded, face solemn.

“I am afraid they are true.” If Ursa had to play a hand, the time was now. This was her last opportunity to control the narrative before the news spiralled. “The Fire Lord has been poisoned.”

How’s sympathy was genuine, and Ursa knew he no doubt thought of his own King. “I am so sorry to hear.”

All that hung in the air for a long moment was the steam of their tea. Ursa took a careful sip. “I am happy to report he is doing better.” The lie was easy. “We have administered an antidote, and the outlook is strong.” When Ursa had dropped her books off to Mai the day before —one a dense and dated repertoire of go to formulas for all manner of maladies, two others on biomes of the Fire Nation and corresponding botanies, still another on numerous herbalistic methodologies—she had a hope these would be words she could utter truthfully.

How sipped at his own tea. “That is great news to hear.” Again, it was genuine. “You know, I once met Fire Lord Iroh.” That gave Ursa pause, and the man continued. “We met on the battlefields surrounding Ba Sing Se.” It sucked her breath from her and she tightened her grip on the ceramic teacup, letting its heat linger and bite at the tips of her fingers.

“Is that so?” she asked at last, finally setting her cup down upon its platter.

He nodded solemnly. “The Fire Lord is a good man,” he added after a moment, pulling himself from his silent musings. “It is truly unfortunate, what has happened.”

Ursa nodded, swallowing down the stammer in her heart at the direction the conversation had briefly turned. “Indeed.” She cleared her throat. “The reason I wanted to meet with you this morning is to discuss your departure.” It shifted the mood at once, back to the political. She topped off her tea from the pot left on the table, mindful of the long sweep of her sleeves. “Although the Fire Lord is recovering, I feel it best we conclude this round of talks early.”

How frowned sharply, stroking at his beard briefly in thought, his own tea now abandoned. Ursa had no such disrespect for her tea, and she returned to it, sipping at it as he considered her words. “Of course,” he said at last. “I can understand that.”

“I intend to address it at the first of the mornings’ meetings.” They each were heads of their respective councils, and the unquestionable leaders of the attempts at diplomacy between countries. Ursa discussing the matter with How before the day’s proceedings was yet another diplomatic move that they both understood. “I feel it best we keep the details of Iroh’s illness to ourselves for the time being.”

“Hmm, and I suppose those details are related to the attack?”

“Of course.” How sighed, finally lifting his own cup and sipping at the now cooled liquid. Ursa seized the moment. “The parties responsible for both the attack and the poisoning have been apprehended and will be dealt with accordingly.”

“I am glad to hear.”

“The truth, of course, will come out eventually.” That, at least, was honest. “With luck, the Fire Lord will be well enough by week’s end to make an appearance, and at that time we can assuage the concerns.” With Iroh ill and her commitments growing by the day, time was becoming too tight to spare, and furthermore, she wanted their guests from the Earth Kingdom gone before a time would come that the inevitable would make itself known: Iroh would be far from better by week’s end, and nothing would change that, all she could do now was try and maintain the fallout appropriately.

She lingered after General How left, enjoying a brief respite before she had to move on with her day, taking time to enjoy the tea—it’s aroma, it’s flavor, it’s warmth. It soothed her nerves and helped still her hands.

Eventually, one of her personal guards arrived to slip her a scroll and several notes. There was a change in the day’s agenda, already the general having decided to halt several of the mid afternoon’s talks; one note was from the boy she had only just met with that morning—her message had been sent—and a final letter, folded tightly and closed with the an elegant wax seal bearing the crest of Ukano’s family. Michi had responded to her last message.

The calm she had worked so hard to maintain fell away as she read over the response, her hands clutching the paper, eyes pouring over the words again and again as if she might suddenly find the joke beneath them, because surely—

Ursa took a breath and folded it, stowing it and the other notes away within her robes, burying the information away to be addressed sometime later in the uncertain future, too much else taking precedent for the time being.

Finally, after a moment, she was able to collect herself and she stood, seeing herself out and back to the palace for the next meeting.


	7. Ursa Alone, Part 2

Ursa’s personal lab was one of a number of large rooms set within an elaborate folly built upon the grounds of the Royal Gardens, and the ancient wooden door betrayed its age as it creaked angrily when she swung it open, though the lock still clicked with ease. It stirred the stale air and the chill of the long closed off room drew shivers from both her and Mai. Ursa ushered the girl inside and locked the door behind them, occupying herself with lighting a lone oil lamp to supplement the meager light pouring through the dust-stained glass of the roof above them.

She had not visited the spot in some time, otherwise busied by her ever growing duties. The space had once belonged to the late wife of Fire Lord Azulon, and had been gifted to her upon her marriage into the royal family as a private place she could do with what she wished: and she had filled it with the things she loved with the aim of saving those things from being forever tainted by Ozai.

Mai now stood in the very same spot as Ozai the night Ursa had concocted for him her poison, looking, as he had, over a table of complicated, delicate equipment, which now were cloaked in white sheets to protect them from the passage of time. Her arms, though, were full of the books Ursa had piled upon her the day before, tasked now with relocating them at last to a more appropriate spot, which for the moment was in the first empty space Mai found fitting, upon a vacant desk, before returning to join Ursa in carefully pulling the covers from her instruments. 

It was a task she could have entrusted to few others, and Mai assisted her with cautious hands, aware of the value and fragility of the alchemical supplies, having her own space back home much like the one they stood in now. 

“I have been in touch with your mother,” Ursa said after a moment, shaking the drop cloths of the bulk of their dust and gathering them across the length of her arm. 

Mai did not seem surprised, barely giving it much consideration before murmuring an, “Is that so?” Her hand trailed across the top of the table, fingers stirring up dust. They were long and dainty and well manicured, the tips painted dark. Ursa passed one of the cloths off to her to occupy her hands with, and Mai set to folding it without being asked.

Ursa narrowed her eyes, mirroring her actions with the remaining fabric. “She seems to be convinced that your father was possessed by evil spirits.”

That caught her off guard, and Mai swung startled eyes up to meet Ursa’s. “Surely you do not believe her.” The fabric hung from her hands, forgotten mid-fold.

Since long before Ursa had been a girl growing up on the outskirts of the northern mountains, spirituality and superstition had been a strong presence throughout the region. Even her mother, who had practiced the sciences, had held deep beliefs regarding the spirits and their role in the world around them and upon their property had been an elegant shrine to Agni, the favored deity of the region.

Ursa was not at all certain what she believed. “Such things are not beyond the realm of possibility,” she asserted carefully, gauging Mai’s reaction to the news. The girl had returned her attention back to her task, smoothing the crease of the final fold and setting the neat square aside, refusing to look back at her.

“I understand that your father was acting strangely,” Ursa reiterated, “And that Michi’s suggestion seems a far leap to make.” Mai nodded in agreement, tracing the fulcrum of the largest balance, stopping to tap her index finger against the top, which set the scales to quivering briefly. “However, your mother revealed to me a great deal of troubling details that perhaps lend credence to her suggestion.”

Mai again turned doubtful eyes upon her, but now her brow was creased with agitation at Ursa’s pushing of the subject. “My mother is a kook,” she deadpanned. It was not the word Ursa would have used, but it was not inaccurate. Michi had always been a vain woman, enamored by the outlandish and prone to drama and taken quite quickly by sophistry. “My father was gone for days at a time, and he would not speak to any of us, but to suggest that he was _possessed_ is a ridiculous notion.”

Ursa thought about Michi’s words, which had described to her a man who spoke in nonsensical sentences, who seemed to no longer react to pain or to cold, who stayed absent for sometimes weeks on end. Mai’s answer did not entirely satisfy her, but Ursa decided the girl was being truthful in her disbelief at her mother’s suggestion. She was hiding something, but it seemed it did not relate at all to her father and his inexplicable behavior.

The other woman had returned to exploring the room around her and its contents, and Ursa paused to assess it as well. It had been a number of years since her last visit, and its lack of use was obvious. Shelves of reagents held more empty vials than not, and at least one appeared to have toppled from its home to shatter against the floor, likely dislodged by a rodent. Yet more shelves held books and delicate glass flasks of all sizes and shapes. A number of loosely rolled scrolls poked out from the cubby of her desk, their ends faded and curling, and a quill sat within a long dried out pot of ink, the pigment now coagulated and crusted within.

"My stores need replenishing, but this space should be more than suitable for you.” From a shelf Ursa pulled a small wooden crate, which was empty save for gathered cobwebs. “Everything will need to be cleaned as well, of course.” She passed the box to Mai who took it, looking vaguely dumbfounded.

“Surely this can be done by an attendant—”

“It will be done by you,” Ursa cut in sharply. “This equipment is delicate. I will allow no one else to handle it.” At Mai’s agape response she swept her own hand inside the box to catch the cobwebs, shaking them aside. “Down the path to the left is the garden house. The door should be unlocked this time of day, and inside you should find whatever you need.”

Mai frowned, eyes lazily following the cobwebs as they drifted to the floor before flicking back up to look at Ursa. “I am not objecting to the work, only—Would you not prefer me to be with the Fire Lord?”

Ursa considered her. “Iroh’s fever broke early this morning. I have decided that the palace physician and the High Sage are more than equipped to stay by his side for the moment.”

The girl sat the crate down upon the vacant corner of the table with a soft noise that might have been a sigh. “And what am I to do here, then?” Mai asked, setting upon her task. She gathered together the discarded fabric from before, nestling it inside to serve as a protective cushion for the more fragile items. Ursa watched, pleased, as she set upon the already partially dismantled _alembic,_ cradling the bulbous retort with care as she situated it within her make-shift nest.

“I have been giving thought to your research on the suppression of bending.” Mai froze, and her eyes were panicked when they met Ursa’s. “But that is a matter we can discuss another time. To start, let us get the lab in order and I think I would like for you to learn to make Azula’s tea.”

In truth, it was not the tea itself that Azula drank but rather what was made to be added to it—tea being the best vessel for delivery—that steadied her daughter’s soul and eased her precarious mind. If she recalled correctly, one of the last times she had stood in this room had been while making the tonic. Her instructions and recipe were extremely clear and precise—as they should be—and the palace physician had taken over the job when Iroh had appointed her to sit at the head of his council and her already strained spare time had been snatched away.

“It should be no trouble for you,” Ursa continued. Mai was very aware of Azula’s tonic, as such prolonged coexistence led to few secrets, and she had witnessed, over nearly a lifetime of knowing her, the very same volatility within Azula as Ursa had.

Mai nodded. “Alright,” she responded.

Around Ursa’s wrist was still wrapped the cord of the key and she pulled it from her sleeve, holding it out to dangle in the space between them. “Mai, I am entrusting you with this. Do you understand?”

She had resumed what she was doing and was now tucking the stillpot alongside the distillation bulb, but she paused to reach out and pluck the key from her hand. “I do,” she affirmed.

“Excellent.” Ursa made for the door. “I will arrange for the physician’s assistant to come by shortly to provide you the recipe, and an attendant should be by soon as well to collect from you a list of anything you might need.”

Mai worried her lip between her teeth. “I understand,” she echoed once more, and Ursa nodded and finally bid her a quick farewell.

* * *

_Her daughter's cry bled into a scream as Ozai snatched Azula from her arms. Ursa was powerless to fight him, but she dragged herself to her feet anyway, throwing herself at Ozai and succeeding only in angering him more. He was taller and stronger, his body thick with muscle, and he tossed her back down easily, barely swayed by her effort._

_She landed hard, her shoulder cracking, the world around her falling alarmingly silent, Azula’s screams having come to a halt. She tore her eyes from where they had landed on her son, who lay frightening still across the room, to seek out her daughter. Azula, who had been more successful in tearing herself from her father’s grasp, now lay in a heap on the floor. Ozai had reached the end of his patience, discarding the poison_ _—_

_(his voice still chanted in her mind: we’re in this together now, I die, they die)_

_—in favor of his fire, which had come to life in the palm of his now raised hand._

_It was not the heat of his fire, though, that had raised the temperature in the room and brought it to silence. Azula was climbing to her feet, her small body catching fire, cascading heat throughout the room, it’s power making the air ripple and swell. It easily swallowed Ozai’s flame, extinguishing it and forcing him backwards. Azula’s mouth fell open in a silent scream, her loose hair flying about her, becoming the flames that danced around her body. Her silhouette grew brighter and brighter, until she became nothing but a white glow and the pain of looking upon her forced Ursa to look away._

_She managed to get back to her feet, raising her good arm high so that the sweep of her sleeve might help block the blinding light cast by her daughter and provide some semblance of relief from the horrific heat melting the air and warping the world around her._

_Ozai, who was now nothing more than a dark smear of shadow, was shouting, but his words were drowned out by the noise of the fire, which consumed everything as it crawled across the room. Ursa stumbled his way, gritting her teeth in determination. Behind her, where the large stone doors of the bunker had been wrought closed, a commotion had begun, a loud boom that only set the room to ringing more._

_Iroh had arrived._

_Desperate to buy time, she threw herself once more at her husband, catching him unawares this time, her body slamming fast into his back. He did not topple fully, but it set his wild eyes back upon her, the sneer returning to his face. He staggered upright, but she had done the job._

_The doors slammed open and the room cackled and filled with static. The hairs on the back of her neck raised, goosebumps tickling up her arms, and a blue hued shatter broke through the roar, catching Ozai in the chest. He did not collapse right away, jerking forward instead as if in one last, desperate attempt to fight back. It was for naught: Ozai crumpled and the lightning stopped abruptly._

_Azula glowed like a sun and, even with the arrival of Iroh and the defeat of her father, it did not stop; the fire did not die but instead seemed to become worse. Ursa’s world spun and she stumbled forward, crying out her daughter’s name, pleading for her to stop. Her eyes shone violently, glowing red like magma, and at the sound of her name they met hers, their color flickering._

_Ursa forced herself to her, pushing through the flames, which seemed almost to part for her passage, though they licked against her legs and grabbed at the cotton of her robes. She threw her arms around the small girl, enveloping her and pulling her close. Azula’s body was molten with an unearthly heat and it at once burned through Ursa’s thin nightrobe, searing her skin. Still, Ursa clung to her._

_“It’s over,” she begged, “It’s over.”_

_All at once, it stopped_ _—the noise, the heat, the flames—_ _and Azula collapsed into her arms, unconscious._

* * *

  
Ursa barely heard him, his voice catching roughly on each movement needed to form the word, but still, it tumbled from him again and it was only then that she caught what he said: “Kyoshi.”

She stood and rushed to Iroh’s side, clasping his hand fast in hers. For a moment it shook and he seemed to still be lost, words failing to leave his lips, but upon them were still the shapes _Avatar_ and _Kyoshi_. Then, abruptly, he seemed to become lucid, clear eyes blinking up at her, his hand squeezing hers in return, albeit weakly. He finally found words. “The Avatar,” he managed again, “Please, bring her to me.”

Her stomach dropped and she tore her hand from his lest she become unable to, desperate as she was to keep him awake and talking and alive. Her own words stumbled for a moment, but she slipped out a “yes” before departing from his side.

It was late and Toph, when Ursa summoned her, had clearly just fallen asleep, and they walked in uncomfortable silence. The girl was small in the shadows of the hallway. Clad in a gown of silk in the palest of green, the lights cast against her in a manner that made her appear almost ghoulish and wispy.

Toph was alarmingly quiet and tense when Ursa eventually led her in, and it struck her how young she really was. Scarcely a woman, and still so naive and innocent to the world, and to the lives lived before her own: the tragedy of Ursa’s grandfather Roku, brought down by his own hubris; the terrible plight of the airbender, who had vanished without so much of a whisper of who he had been; the utter destruction wrought by Hama, as she had torn the life from the bodies of soldiers and reanimated them against their brethren. Now she stood as Toph, a blind girl born to rich parents, protected and sheltered and kept away from the worst of the world, although that was only going by the information she’d acquired of her through her own means.

Iroh’s eyes had told her this moment was for the Avatar only, and so she led the girl inside and then exited without a word. Toph’s attention had been immediately taken by Iroh, and neither noticed as she left to give them privacy.

It was a while before the Avatar returned, and she was shaken, and though she curled her hands into fists to hide the nervousness in her fingers and squared her shoulders to bear the sudden weight of something spoken between only her and a dying man, Ursa could tell that it was troubling, and her stomach twisted at the possibilities.

“Toph, if I may have a moment?”

The girl was visibly startled, and she lifted her chin to put her eyes in the general direction of Ursa, pressing her lips into a tight line. “Yes,” she breathed out after a moment. “Of course.”

Ursa accompanied her back to her room, aware of the watchful eyes of imperial guards dotted here and there, most of them tucked out of sight. “I intended to tell you in the morning,” Ursa told her as she led her along, referring to Iroh. “I apologize for the nature through which it was revealed to you.”

Toph halted abruptly but did not turn her way. “Is he going to die?” Her bluntness bordered on offensive, but Ursa took a breath and considered the girl’s tired frame.

“We have reason to believe he will not make it.”

Ursa thought of the sealed scroll she had slipped to the water tribe boy that morning, and the desperate plea inked within that she felt more than likely would prove to be a hopeless endeavor. She did not voice it, and Toph remained still and quiet for a long while. Ursa could not begin to guess at what was going through her mind, and so instead she stood by patiently as she processed her thoughts.

“What will happen then?” she asked, and Ursa truthfully did not know what to tell her. She did not entirely know herself.

Zuko’s doubts were often quick to cloud his confidence, but he was not ill-equipped to rule. He had a level head and a compassionate heart and strong loyalists who would sit on his counsel and advise him well. He was educated and powerful, but politely humble. Ursa was proud of the son she had raised and of the leader he would become. But neither she nor their nation were prepared to crown a new Fire Lord. There was foulness afoot and traitorous behavior slipping into their ranks and bringing them to heel, all the while the tensions with the North grew rockier and less predictable. There was no doubt in her mind that there was someone orchestrating all of these chains of events, and by design now was the worst possible time to usher in a new Fire Lord.

“I do not know,” Ursa confessed softly, because it felt cruel to lie to Toph, who was so determined to remain and see the chaos through. They continued on in silence until eventually Ursa decided to bring herself to the point she had been building towards, “Our guests will be leaving the morning next.” The latter half of Ursa’s day had been spent making the arrangements, and that had been the earliest ship that could leave port for the Earth Kingdom. There would be one last meeting in the morning and then they would convene for the duration of their remaining stay.

Toph murmured out a soft acknowledgment of what she had said, head down.

“Avatar Toph, while we are truly thankful for your presence and aid in this trying time, I wanted to impress upon you that you should not feel any obligation to stay and potentially put yourself into more danger.” Ursa hated having to put that upon her, already aware of the strain the girl bore being touted and looked after as she was. Still, the days and weeks ahead would be trying. “It is asking a lot of you to expect you to stay, and I only wanted to tell you this so that you can come to your own decision.”

What she meant was clear, however; if Toph were to go, her last good opportunity would be on that ship with all of the other Earth Kingdom citizens.

The girl nodded. “I understand,” she said. “I will think about it.”

* * *

Ursa knew her path to Ozai, had herself approved the transfer to his new cell, which was deeper underground in the prison, and put more distance between himself and escape. She allowed only one guard to accompany her, who she ordered to remain some distance behind, and she ushered herself through the narrow halls until at last she found herself before him.

Not once had she visited him since the conclusion of his trial, and his shock at the sight of her was genuine. He was lounging on his cot, aware of the approaching footsteps, but unworried, as it would seem. At the sight of her he sat up straighter, swinging his legs over the side of the bed to face her properly.

His hair had not been cut in some time, nor had his beard been trimmed. His clothing was of poor quality and hung from a frame leaner than she remembered. Some twisted part of her was pleased to see him in such a state: filthy and disheveled, brought down to such a lowly place. All throughout her descent down she had felt a growing unease, but seeing him as he was now steadied her nerves.

She had not come to say anything in particular to him, instead having been driven there by a need to see him in a cell, to remind herself fully that he was locked away and of no danger. She had questions that tickled her lips, but she kept them to herself. She could not prove he was directly involved with the ill-timed chaos being wrought in the nation, but his shadow was there in the motives.

Azula visited him more often than Ursa liked, and so she had selected from amongst the many prison guards one who would report to her and arranged for his schedule to align with her daughter’s favored visitation hours. It was a sufficient enough manner for keeping tabs on the activity between the two that she was aware Ozai knew the goings on of the world outside of his prison. Ursa was also certain that he knew about the attack a few nights prior, and more importantly, about the poisoning of the Fire Lord.

"My dear wife," he drawled, his cracked lips twisting into a sick grin. “What brings you here?” His voice was hoarse and aged, and it no longer sent the shudder through her it once did. She almost smiled, but could not allow him the pleasure of seeing it. He had played a large role in shaping her into the person she now was, and she would let him see that fully. She looked him over cooly, pressing her lips together, deciding what to say. “Has Azula finally—”

“Do not speak to me about Azula,” Ursa snapped, cutting him off.

Ozai laughed. “Does she remember yet?”

“Of course she does not,” Ursa sneered at him, stepping forward angrily. Ursa remembered though: fire hot like the sun, which burned with an energy so bright it hummed and sang in tune with the world around it, which rippled and bent to its will. A fire that came to life so fiercely the world parted to make room for it.

“Agni’s fire.” Ozai knew not to speak the words, but he pushed her anyway, delighted to be saying them. “To think that my own flesh and blood would bear the blessing of Agni.” It was not the first time they had discussed it, though Ursa had made herself more than clear. If he wished ever to be able to visit with Azula he would never utter a word. Ursa was a changed person; she would not hesitate this time, and Ozai kept his word, though she largely knew it was because he lacked information on what truly transpired the night of his defeat, on what the very words she’d forbid him to speak to their daughter actually meant. He could speak little of what he himself did not understand.

But Ursa understood.

Sozin’s Comet had come and gone before Ursa finally allowed her daughter to visit Ozai, and had permitted even Zuko to do the same, though he had never taken her up on the offer as far as she was aware. Ozai had held no love in his heart for his son, and made it no secret. Had he his way, he would have killed them all rather than be met with Iroh’s force and have the throne ripped away from him, and Zuko had been the first he’d snatched up.

Finally Ozai stood, reaching up to drag his hand through his ragged hair, which revealed how long it had truly become. In his prime he had been handsome; Ursa could still remember the first time she had met him: the broadness of his chest, the strong set of his jaw, the ripple of his muscles had set her to blushing. That was a time long gone.

“I have had a long time to reflect,” Ozai told her. He approached the bars and then beckoned her, gesturing to the ground with the indication she should sit, as he now did, settling his legs across one another. “Stay a while, Ursa. Talk with me.”

She chanced a glance back to the doorway, through which she could see cast across the rocky earth the shadow of the lone guard, keeping watch. She relented, settling carefully onto the ground, tucking her legs beneath her and drawing her heavy robes close to keep away the chill. It seeped up into her anyway and she could not stop a brief shiver.

“Tell me, how is my brother?”

Ursa barked out a vicious laugh. “Do you take me for a fool?” she hissed. She stood abruptly, done with placating him. She had hoped perhaps sitting for a moment and letting him speak might reveal to her something vital, but it seemed he was eager for nothing more than to enrage her.

Ozai howled out a laugh, calling out to her as she left, “Well then tell me this, Ursa, do you believe Zuko is fit to be the next Fire Lord?”

She did not allow it to give her pause, letting the door slammed closed against his laughter. 

* * *

It was late when at last she made it to her room, the palace chilly and her body worn ragged and shuddering beneath her robes. A fire had already been started for her ahead of her arrival, but it’s warmth had yet to properly permeate the space. She felt her exhaustion down to her bones and she stopped only briefly before the warmth to soak it in before moving along to her vanity to prepare for the few hours of sleep she might hope to get if she hurried herself. to bed. Scrubbing her face and brushing her hair of the day took far more effort than she had energy for, but in the wake of Iroh’s poisoning she had shed herself of all but one attendant—a feeble old woman who held only scarcely more of her trust than the rest of her personal staff now did—and she could only work the poor woman so much.

The face reflected in her mirror was every bit as morose as her soul and she sighed it out, her eyes damp with the stress of the day. It came upon her fast: the wetness gathering in her eyes overflowed and spilled and became a torrent. She pressed a trembling hand to her mouth to help aid in choking back the sobs, but they wracked her anyway. Even with the tears she could not still herself for long, her body calling for rest. Ursa took a few moments to compose herself briefly, and, wiping at her eyes with a fresh cloth folded neatly on the edge of her vanity, stood upon shaky legs.

Tomorrow she would have to tell her son, and she had to be strong for him.

She discarded her robe for a night slip, and as she did she could not stop her eyes from wandering to her own reflection again, this time cast in the large full length mirror of her enormous wardrobe. The cut of her gown revealed the small vial that hung from a sturdy cord around her neck, hidden within reach upon her person at all times. Ursa toyed with it for a moment before finally pulling it from over her head and setting it gently upon the table at her bedside, where it glistened in the light of the moon shining through her window just as it had the night she had made it beneath the watchful eyes of Ozai. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author's Note added 11/23:
> 
> And with this chapter, this story has officially broken my word count record for a single story. I've had a few people ask about the expected length of this fic and I think I can say with a fair amount of certainty now that this will absolutely break the 100k mark. I've written ahead substantially, especially some of the pivotal twists and climaxes, and that alone is nearing 15k of material. Almost everything onwards has been pretty well outlined in advance so I fully intend to finish this story.
> 
> To everyone who has commented: thank you so much. I always look forward to reading them and they make my day every time.


	8. Ill Winds

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I love how I ended the last chapter with this big commitment to following through on finishing this story and then didn't update for over a month. I've been actively working on this, and I was finally able to acquire a beta to help review the past chapters and give feedback on the plot. There may be another gap in future updates, but if anything I am refining the story and working to make it better.
> 
> Thanks for all of the support.

Azula slipped in scarcely a few minutes after their m other left, likely awaiting the woman's exit. Zuko’s  heart was still tight in his chest and his eyes damp and he did not immediately turn to face her. The door clicked closed, her sharp footsteps carrying her over to the edge of his bed. She came into view of the mirror on his  vanity, in front of which he still sat, settling to lean against one of the four posters of the bed.

“Why are you here?” he asked as he dragged his hand through his hair, which still sat loose about his shoulders. He needed to be preparing for his day but a weight lodged in his heart seemed to fix him in place. His hand shook as he combed through his hair, the tangles catching his fingers causing him to release an annoyed breath.  A sigh from his sister prompted him to fin ally turn to face her.

“I came to express my condolences.”

Azula, as always, was unreadable. Her eyes were soft, her mouth downturned, and her head tilted just so to feign a sympathetic expression. It was impossible to tell if she was being genuine.

He eyed her warily.

“For uncle or for my becoming Fire Lord?” he asked.

Zuko found his voice was a croak, and he quickly cleared his throat, turning away from her once more to hide his face.

“Why not both?” Azula chuckled, crossing her arms, still watching him in the mirror. She paused, her own voice seeming to catch. “But in all seriousness, Zuko. I  _ am  _ sorry. I’m not unaware of how difficult this must be, for you especially.”

Zuko stood and stalked over to his wardrobe to rifle through the clothing there. “It’s appreciat ed. Is that all you’ve come by for? I need to start preparing for my day.” He gathered his formal robes into his arms.

His mother had requested his appearance at th e, hastily put together, closing proceedings with the Earth Kingdom diplomats. An affair that would likely take hours, given the situation unfolding around them. Azula was already dressed for her day, which would likely start the same as his if she actually attended the meeting. He wondered  how far she would hurt her reputation to k eep spiting their mother.

“Hurry and get ready, I’ll wait. We’re heading the same way,” she raked her eyes over him, taking in his disheveled state. “And I did want to speak with you.”

Zuko sighed and strode across the room to the large divider panels set up in the corner nearest to the vanity, hauling it open and draping his robes over top of it. Azula was not to be deterred, and it was with immense displeasure that he began to change behind th e divider so that his sister could remain and harass him.

“How is the Avatar doing?”

He frowned at the phrasing of h er question. “Her training is going well,” he told her, “I think she will be firebending soon.” Zuko shucked off his night clothes, letting them crumple to the floor. Then, recalling part of his conversation with their mother, plucked them off the ground and carefully draped them over the free end of the divider.

Security throughout the entire palace was being tightened, especially so within the royal apartments. Ursa had dismissed much of the staff that worked in their wing, relocating them elsewhere. His own attendants had been forbidden entry to his room, lest he was there, and he suspected the same was true for Azula.

“Will she be leaving in the morning?”

Zuko hoped not, but he could not say with certainty given his mother's reservations about it. It seemed the woman had a change of heart, and now was hesitant to let the Avatar remain.

"I’ll be meeting with her later this morning to talk it over," he told his sister as he slipped into his pants. To change the subject, he added, “She’s been asking after you, by the way.”

"Has she now? She is aware I am taken?" Zuko couldn't help but laugh with her for a moment.

"Your bending impressed her."

"Oh?"

He stepped from around the divider, pulling his arms through the first of his robes. "Don't sound surprised."

Azula laughed again. She had sat down in the chair of his vanity while he changed, and her eyes were fixed on her reflection. She turned to meet his gaze. "I would be more than happy to train her myself," she told him with a wry grin. 

He saw it for what it was: an attempt to rile him up. He ignored the remark, and eventually she returned her gaze to the mirror, letting them fall into silence, until at last he came over to usher her from his seat so that he could take her place and begin pulling his hair up.

After a while, just as he finished tying up his topknot, she revealed her true purpose for coming by. “I’m worried about mother.”

It gave him real pause and he shot her a wary look. “You are hardly making her life easier, Azula.”

She shrugged. “She should be more than capable of handling me by now, Zuko.” Azula replied dryly. She stepped over, having again been lingering by the bedpost, and grabbed up his headpiece.

It was a classic Azula power move and Zuko snatched it back from before she could settle it in his hair herself, an act which momentarily startled her. She yanked her hand away and stepped clear of him.

“She is acting in Uncle’s place, and someone is plotting against us. She has a lot on her plate.” Still, Zuko could understand his sister’s worry. Their mother was in one of the most difficult positions of all of them. Yet she seemed completely in control of everything that was going on.

Zuko slipped the hairpiece over his topknot, securing it in place. Azula did not immediately respond, and he glanced over to see her eyes fixed on the mirror. “Azula?”

She swung her eyes down to meet his in the reflection. “How do you think this ends, Zuko?” she asked softly.

He could still remember—sitting on the floor with his sister, their backs to the wall, her shoulder touching his, her croaking out ‘ _ how do you think this ends? _ ’ just after the first of their fathers mad executions. She had followed him and sat as he had wept, allowing him to cling to her hand. They never talked about it— _ no one _ ever talked about it—but her words  _ now  _ echoed her words then, and they carried with them the same horror settling upon them once more. Every morning they woke up no longer knowing what the day might bring. No one could say what was to come.

But Zuko did know one thing. Soon he would have  to be the Fire Lord.

“Mother says Uncle may still recover,” he rasped out, and Azula narrowed her eyes.

“She really said that?” She didn’t bother to hide her shock, “Personally, I doubt Uncle will last another week.”

“I don’t know what you want me to say, Azula,” he snapped, “I guess I’ll be the Fire Lord, is how all of this is going to end.”

Azula let out an annoyed noise. “Try to sound more excited, then,” she told him. She turned and headed for the door. “Just help me watch out for mother. And hurry up, I’ll wait outside.”

* * *

Toph woke with a heavy throat and an itchy face, her nose hot and runny and beset by sniffles. She groaned loudly and wiped at her face with the sleeve of her gown. There was a muffled thumping noise that she at first mistook for the pounding discomfort in her ears, but it did not follow the beat of her heart and through her grogginess she realized it was a knocking at her door.

It was Jin that entered, and the moment Toph’s feet hit the ground she realized it was far later than she should have been allowed to sleep in. There was a steady buzz of movement throughout the palace that she could sense at the edge of her periphery, and it was far too warm to be sunrise. “Where is Zuko?” Toph managed after a moment. Speaking revealed how thoroughly her throat ached.

Jin sounded distant, moving about the room as she always did, performing her duties. “The Prince sent a message along that the two of you would not be training today.”

Toph swallowed heavily and it stung the back of her throat. She heaved out a sigh, rubbing aggressively at her eyes, which had begun to itch. “Did he say why?” Groggy as she was, Toph could clearly remember how strikingly ill Fire Lord Iroh had been as she had held his hand the night before, and how briefly uncertain Lady Ursa had been in confessing to her that the way forward was unclear. And she especially recalled how quick the woman had been to suggest she consider leaving.

Toph did not doubt her ability to hold her own against anything thrown at her, nor did she remotely fear for her safety. Yet she was not ignorant to the reality of her situation: should she stay, and should something by chance actually happen to her on Fire Nation soil, then the currently unfolding chaos would just become a precursor of far worse to come.

She had not slept well, though that had hardly been the only thing weighing on her. Her heart thumped and her eyes dampened at the recollection of Iroh’s quiet admission to her:  _ His name was Aang and he lived out a quiet life on _ _ — _

“No,” Jin replied, pulling her from her thoughts, “But he said he will be by shortly to collect you for tea.”

Tea sounded fantastic, so Toph did not object. Jin, perhaps aware of how stuffy she felt, drew a hot bath for her as she busied herself with piling her hair atop her head. The steam cleared her nose, aided by the addition of a strongly aromatic soap. Her attendant departed after a moment, and Toph let her chin momentarily dip into the sudsy water, heaving out a sigh.

Iroh's words, though they had been weak and at times hardly coherent, shook her. To now hold such knowledge humbled her but simultaneously wrought her with guilt and trepidation, along with too many other feelings she did not know how to articulate. She recalled the memory from her dream, in which she had stood alone amongst bodies, having stolen from the soldiers the very air they breathed: an element of peace becoming a twisted, monstrous thing as ten thousand years of spirits had intervened in what might have been a quick death. That the airbender had lived and escaped was speculative —he had vanished without a trace—and the year of Hama’s birth was equally as speculative, but from Toph’s vague understanding of the woman it must have been sometime after the start of the war.

Which left—

Tears had leaked from the Fire Lord’s eyes as he had told her the story of the Avatar born of the Air Nomads, spilling secrets he had sworn an oath to keep, passing that burden now onto her: his name was Aang and he was no longer the last airbender. And now she knew where to find them, when the time was right.

_ Their name was Aang and they were caught in a storm. The rain beat hard and frigid upon his back, drenching him and weighing him down. The wind screamed and betrayed him and he fought against it, trying desperately to rise higher and break the line of clouds and escape the storm. He was weak and pained and injured, but the sky and its violence did not care. His glider was ripped from him. _

_ For a moment the wind bent to his will and cradled itself around him, slowing his fall and protecting him from the blows of the world around him. But the storm raged harder and snatched that, too, away from him. The waters beneath him churned with the furor of the storm, and the waves were unrelenting as they dragged him down _ _ — _

Toph lurched from the waters of her bath, beneath which she had slipped, drawing in a shuddering breath of air that should have been warm but was not: her bath had become cold, and with it the steam had been sucked from the room. Her body shook, from the memory and from the chill set upon her, and she climbed from  the now cool water s and snatched up one of the towels her attendant had left for her.

Jin was concerned when she saw her, having been otherwise occupied with making up her bed and laying clothing for her upon it. She opened her mouth to speak and Toph beat her to it.

“Leave,” she said, overwhelmed by yet another horrible memory and suddenly desiring nothing more than to be alone with it. Her hair, which had become damp from her slip beneath the waters, dripped cold droplets around her shoulders and onto the floor. She reached up one hand to tear at it in frustration, pulling it from its nest. It fell limp around her face.

The other woman picked up a brush and started for her. Toph stepped forward to meet her, taking the brush herself. “I can manage, please.”  Her voice was a croak, “Tell Prince Zuko I will meet him in the foyer in half an hour.”

As best she could tell, Jin gave a sharp nod that she followed up with a quick bow, to Toph’s surprise, before she exited without a word. In the alarming silenc e that followed Toph took several deep breaths, reminding herself she could breath, that what happened was nothing but a memory, that she was not  _ them _ . She had these memories, and they were not her own.

The airbender’s fate would not be hers. Hama’s fate would not be hers.

She let herself slip to the floor, pressing her back to the hard frame of her bed. The cold still ate at her, the towel she'd wrapped about he rself a clammy  damp weight. Toph shivered but stayed where she was as she set to yanking the brush through her hair, immediately frustrated at having sent her attendant away with herself in such a state. Her brief plunge underwater had only worsened her sniffles and she wiped at the moisture gathering at the tip of her nose with the towel before finally discarding it entirely.

Standing was a f rustrating endeavor—the tile was slick with the water she had dripped about and she caught the towel with her foot to brace herself, shoving it around to mop at the water. It met the wall with a dull, wet thump momen ts later, the final victim of the brunt of her anger.

* * *

The Royal Tea Room was located at the top of the palace, situated just above the royal apartments, a breath away from the quarters of the Fire Lord. It was a place that held a certain air of sacredness, built and kept especially for the attendance of the Fire Lord and his most esteemed guests, accessible by none other than the royal family, and sized such that no more than two persons could comfortably be seated. 

Zuko had taken tea in this room with three different Fire Lords, but most frequently with his uncle. For over a decade the man had regaled him with tales of his exciting life over tea and tantalized him with strategy and tactic across pai sho boards, every interaction in this space filled with the passing of wisdom.

A tight knot formed in his throat at the thought of Iroh, who lay dying not too far from where he sat. Ursa had come to him before the sun rose, just as he had been stirring. Though her eyes had been damp, she had not wept as she delivered the news.

Fire Lord Iroh did not have much time left.

The future Fire Lord was roused from his musings as the Avatar was escorted in by a guard. He had called for her hours after sunrise, and he suspected Toph had used the extra time to sleep, though she hardly looked as if that had done much. She was put together, but her entire posture spoke to a deeper exhaustion than a few hours extra sleep might have helped.

She slouched as she sat and her clothing was shockingly informal, as if she had planned for nothing more than another day of training. She greeted him with a scratchy voice.

"You're unwell," he noted.

Toph nodded. "Mm, a bit," she confirmed. She gestured in the general direction of her face, adding, "Feeling stuffy, is all."

He nodded in understanding. "The change in the environment, no doubt.” He recalled he r quips about her journey over and the nausea induced by the lurching of the ship. “Better or worse than seasickness?” he asked, managing a grin before letting it drop. The exhaustion and overwhelming pressure of his duties had made him briefly forget that such gestures were lost on the Avatar.

Toph snorted out a laugh that was stifled by her stuffiness. “Definitely not worse.”

Zuko looked past her through the window, out across the city to the spill of grey marring the distant horizon, a dark mass gathering far out over the sea. While the Royal Tea Room had the best view in all of the palace, the increasingly ugly weather tainted the landscape

“There’s a storm coming, as well.” He wondered if she could tell; the air was heavier and humid, broken by an occasional strong wind. “I suppose that hasn’t helped.”

“Yeah,” Toph croaked out , “Fee ls like a big one.”

“The rainy season is upon us,” he explained, “There will likely be many more storms.”

The Avatar nodded in understanding and they fell into uncomfortable silence until at last Toph said, “I heard about the  Fire Lord. I’m sorry. I wish—I wish I had been able to spend more time with him.”

Though she scarcely knew him or his family, it was the most genuine sympathy expressed to him thus far, despite how sick and worn out she clearly was.

“I am sorry as well,” he managed in return. He didn’t know what else to say.

A particularly hard gust blew in, rattling the slatted windows and making the wooden walls creak. It fiercely attacked the burning coals, which sat deep within the hearth. Zuko set about pouring them their tea, lest the wind steal the last of the warmth. She held her hand out to take her cup, and he passed it over to her without a word.

Toph cupped it in both hands, bringing it to her face. She hovered over it for a moment, careful inhaling the rising steam.

“Hopefully the tea will help,” he said to break the silence. The creak of wood, combined with the whistle of the air, was almost haunting. It felt as if the weight of every previous Fire Lord to sit upon the spot he sat now had come to settle upon him and he drew in a breath of steam as well, closing his eyes and letting the world around them drown out the dread growing within him.

Toph seemed content to sip at her tea and let the silence hang over them. For a while neither of them spoke. The c haos of the world around them said everything it needed to. At last the Avatar drew them back down to earth, and the noise seemed to fall away. “Can you tell me about Avatar Roku?”

Zuko opened his eyes, startled at the question. He echoed back to her, “Avatar Roku?” as if he may have heard her wrong.

She frowned, taking a louder than necessary sip of her tea. “You mentioned him to me the other day,” she clarified.

He nodded. “Yes, I remember.” Zuko thought on it a moment, trying to bring to mind the few stories of the man that had been shared with him. “I do not know much of him,” he told her, “My mother would perhaps be a better resource. She knows far more than I do.”

Toph nodded, her disappointment clear .

“I am sure she would be more than happy to answer your questions. I will see her this afternoon and I can speak with her then.”

The Avatar’s face lit up. “Thank you.”

He smiled, nodding. “There may also be some information in the Dragonbone Catacombs,” he added, and her eyes went wide. “Once, they held the histories of all of the past Avatars, but Fire Lord Sozin had much of that destroyed.”

“You said they were friends, at one time at least,” she commented, referring to Avatar Roku.

The brief silence that followed was uncomfortable and Zuko looked away, casting his gaze down onto the dying coals. “They had a falling out.” The real story had never been shared with Zuko in its entirety, only in bits and pieces that conveyed enough for him to know: it was likely Fire Lord Sozin who had struck down Avatar Roku.

Another Avatar killed by the Fire Nation.

He regretted bringing up Avatar Roku at all.

Toph, thankfully, did not press the subject. “I have been thinking about my past lives,” she explained softly. It was a quiet admission almost lost to the wind. “I know so little.”

“Are there not histories kept in Ba Sing Se?”

Toph shook her head, much to his surprise. From what Zuko knew of the city, it was grand and ancient, older even than the capital city of the Fire Nation. He would have thought the location to contain a wealth of knowledge. “Avatar Salai supposedly hailed from Ba Sing Se,” she told him after thinking about it for a moment. “There is a garden in the upper ring with a statue that is said to be of him. I’ve never seen the statue myself, though, so I can’t say for sure if it’s true.” She gave him a lopsided grin, which was interrupted by a quick sniffle. “And anyway, all of the early histories were lost in the Great Quake, so there are no remaining records to confirm it.”

Zuko had only ever heard about the quake that had ruined Ba Sing Se in passing, an event so old there was little to say about it. The Great Quake was the only thing to ever break the ancient city.  _ Even the Great Quake could not topple those walls, _ his uncle had once told him, and that was about as much as he knew.

“That’s a shame. I had never heard of Avatar Salai.”

Toph nodded. “Then there is Avatar Kyoshi. I do know a good deal about her. She’s very famous in the Earth Kingdom.”

Zuko actually knew of Avatar Kyoshi as well. “I have heard she is hailed as one of the greatest Avatars to ever live.”

The woman returned to her tea, focusing on it rather intently. Zuko watched as she swirled the cup about, spilling the smallest bit over the rim.  “Why aren’t we training today?” Toph asked after a while, no longer content to wait until they worked their way back around to the subject. 

“I think perhaps we could both use a brief break, with everything going on,” he explained. “The diplomats are leaving in the morning,” Toph, who seemed displeased about the matter, frowned and Zuko continued quickly, “I heard that my mother spoke with you about your departure —”

It was a poor choice of words and she cut him off at once. “ _ My  _ departure?”

Zuko cleared his throat. "I only meant—" he paused, suddenly not entirely certain what he meant. He took a breath and forged ahead. "I spoke with my mother and I think she was perhaps too quick to suggest you consider leaving tomorrow."

Toph stammered out a surprised, “Oh.” At some point she had finished her tea, and she set her cup down abruptly.

“Going forward I suspect my days will be busier, but I want to commit to seeing your training through.”

That took her remaining words from her and she turned her face down, allowing the sweep of her hair to fall across it. “I really appreciate that,” she replied, voice hoarse. She cleared her throat. “And I want to help, in any way I can.”

* * *

Zuko had been into his mother’s office many times —for meetings, briefings, quick conversations—but never before had he found himself so captured by the state of it. Her desk was a massive, hand carved wooden masterpiece, sat before a large, woven tapestry of the Fire Nation emblem, which took up the entire back wall of the office. Two iron sconces decorated either side, though his mother seldom lit them, choosing instead to work by the light of a large oil lamp she kept on the corner of her desk, which supplemented the meager light pouring in through several small windows slatted along the top of the left wall—betraying its location in the corner of the palace. The entire room was an intimidating presence, nearly as commanding as the office of the Fire Lord himself.

His mother looked small on the other side of the desk, sat in a massive chair cushioned in scarlet. The whole of the surface of her desk was covered in a mess of scrolls and stacks of parchment, a sharp contrast to the tidiness he typically would have seen. He recalled Azula’s concern, and his quickness to toss aside her worry. For all that his mother was composed as always, the world around her seemed to be falling into increasing disarray.

Ursa smiled up at him as he dropped down into the chair awaiting him, setting her quill into its well.

“How did things go with the High Sage?” she asked, waving her hand gently over the scroll she had been working on to aid in drying the fresh ink. “You are here earlier than I expected.”

Zuko couldn’t help but laugh a bit. The High Sage was known for being long winded. “He had to leave to go help secure the temple,” he explai ned, “He  was worried about the storm.”

“Understandable.” She rolled up her scroll and set it aside, turning her entire attention at last onto him. Tired eyes looked him over, and she smiled sadly. Just that morning those same eyes had been strong and steadfast. “What did he have to say?”

“He believes the coronation should be held at the height of midsummer.” Zuko could still remember the delirious heat of the day of his father’s coronation, held as well under the midsummer sun so that the incoming Fire Lord might receive the full blessings of Agni and his spirits.

The silence that followed his statement told him his mother remembered as well. “Midsummer?” she echoed, frowning. “Midsummer is almost a month away.”

Azula’s words returned to him:  _ how do you think this ends? _

A month seemed an eternity.

“He has called for a meeting of the Sages to discuss it,” Zuko continued quickly.

It seemed the news soured his mother’s mood. She stood, chair scraping loudly on the floor. “I will meet with him myself,” she seethed, stepping over to one of the larger bookcases taking up the wall beneath the windows. The shelves, unlike her desk, were still relatively well organized. She selected a large tome from one before returning to him. “For now, let’s discuss the council. The meeting this afternoon is being postponed.”

“Why is that?”

She did not open the book but instead set it upon the edge nearest to him, haphazardly sweeping some scrolls asid e to make room. “Admiral Jeong Jeong’s ship is being delayed due to the storm. It should pass quickly and I expect he will arrive in time for us to meet late this evening.” She returned his attention to the book, tapping the cover. “This is a record of the proceedings of the council thus far this year,” she explained, “Som e of this you are certainly already familiar with, but I need you to review it all in its entirety.”

He nodded, picking it up and flipping briefly through it.

“That is not to leave this room. We will be meeting regularly going forward, so you have time to get through it.”

The book sat heavy in his lap, another weight. Zuko nervously rubbed his thumb against the worn corner of the binding. “I wanted to discuss the Avatar,” he said quickly as his mother settled back into her chair, “She wants to stay, and I agree that she should.”

His mother started moving through the papers on her desk, looking for something in particular. “Fine, she may stay. However I want her guard and attendant to remain as well.” She unfurled a tight scroll, filled with carefully drawn tabl es, checkered with small characters and numbers. “I have let go of a number of the staff, as I mentioned—” It occurred to him as she said it that she had not explicitly told him some of the staff had been permanently dismissed. “It will be helpful to have an extra set of eyes on the Avatar.”

Zuko nodded, unsure of what to say. That had not entirely been his intent, but he understood as much why his mother felt it prudent to keep them present.

“I will also have a room prepared for her closer to us, where she will be more secure.” Ursa dropped the subject there, her attention going back to the plethora of work laid out before her. Zuko let it drop there as well, turning to the large book in his lap and the onerous task ahead of him. Resigned, he eased open the heavy cover.


	9. Downpour

Zuko turned a page, skipping a whole passage. These were abridged in the loosest sense of the word, clearly written in his mother’s pen, with the occasional scribble in the margins to clarify or add a thought here and there. True to her word, there was much of it he recognized from his own passing involvement in the government. It filled the time, which was interrupted only by the occasional roll of thunder in the distance. But his familiarity with it allowed his mind to wander.

Zuko seldom spent time with his mother in this way; she always stood as his mother first, and only rarely as the powerfully positioned person she was underneath. Here in the disquiet of her office, her demeanor was cool and distant, and as he sat and stared down at the tidy scrawl across the parchment, it occurred to him that this is how it was going to be.

Soon he would be the Fire Lord, and she would not be the mother of the Fire Lord but instead a person of his council.

“Will I have the same council?” His voice sounded dry, and he cleared his throat.

He thought for a moment his mother was taken aback by the question, given the pinch of her brow when she looked up to meet his eyes. “Once you are Fire Lord you may request the resignation of council members,” she told him. “Or they may elect to tender the resignation themselves.”

It wasn’t the satisfying answer he had hoped for, but Zuko gave a stiff nod of understanding anyway. Now, potentially faced with such a large decision, he could bring no one to mind that might replace the current council.

Perhaps sensing his distress, Ursa added, “There will be plenty of time to discuss your options.”

Again, he nodded, but it led him onwards, spilling out another question that had been weighing on his mind. “Mother, you told me this morning you thought there was a chance uncle may still pull through—” He was interrupted by a sharp knock at the door, a noise almost drowned out by the growing noise of heavy rain outside of the windows.

A guard entered, and moments later a second one escorted in the Avatar’s companions, who came to stand before Ursa’s desk some distance from where Zuko sat. He turned in his seat so that he could better face them, closing the book in his lap.

The Avatar’s attendant seemed uncharacteristically nervous beneath his mother’s gaze.

“Where is the Avatar?” Ursa asked, voicing the obviousness of the woman’s absence: there the two of them stood, having arrived without her.

“We don’t know,” her guard said.

Toph had told Zuko she wanted to go down into the city, thinking perhaps their spicy meal from several nights prior might ease her congestion. He had warned her of the storm, which at the time had been some ways out. That had been hours ago, and they were coming into late afternoon. In the distance, he heard another loud rumble of thunder, as if to confirm his fears.

His mother had remained silent, her eyes speaking volumes as they stared down the two women. The attendant cleared her throat, darting her eyes down to focus on the tile at her feet. “We went down into Harbor City and she slipped away. We looked all over for her before returning—”

Zuko had not immediately noticed it in the dim lighting, but both of the women were wet from having only just escaped the torrent of rain that now beat against the outside of the palace. Beads of water collected in their hair and on their clothes, and the floor beneath their feet was now slick with water.

The Avatar’s guard snorted, drawing Zuko’s attention to her. She leveled him with a hard stare. “There’s hardly cause to be concerned.”

He chanced a look at his mother, who was stony faced as she took them in.

“And why is that?” he asked, in the wake of his mother’s continued silence.

“The Avatar runs off as she pleases.”

Ursa, at last, decided to speak up. “Elaborate,” she demanded.

Jin looked away, shuffling awkwardly.

“The Avatar  _ is  _ prone to wandering off,” the attendant confirmed. “But she always returns. I agree there’s no reason to be worried, only—” The woman bit her lip, looking to the slatted windows and the darkness beyond them. Another loud roar of thunder echoed into the room. “I think perhaps now isn’t the best time to wait for her to decide to come back.”

Zuko sensed more than one story beneath her words, and he recalled his conversation with Toph just days earlier, when she had cheekily told him she used to sneak off.

He stood. “I can go help look for her—” he began, but his mother cut him off.

“Sit down,” she said, and though it was soft her tone bordered on dangerous.

Zuko obeyed, trying his best not the shrink beneath her order.

“The two of you can go. Jin—” It clearly startled the woman to be addressed by name, and her eyes, behind her rain drenched bangs, were wide. “Pack the Avatar’s room, we will be relocating her shortly.”

Jin nodded. She gave a quick bow, forming the sign of Agni as if she had been doing it all her life. Beside her, Toph’s guard made no move to do the same and simply dipped her head in acknowledgement.

They were led out, and the remaining imperial guard was given several brief orders, among them only a passing remark about sending an entourage out to look for the Avatar. Instructions to send an attendant in to clean the dirtied floor seemed to hold just as much importance, given the tone of his mother’s voice.

Zuko barely heard any of it, eyes constantly drawing themselves to the storm outside.

When at last they were alone his mother spoke directly to him once more.

"I cannot have you running about looking for her," she said softly. “It’s not safe.”

He immediately opened his mouth to object, but she forged ahead before he could speak, dismissing his words. "Need I remind you there is plot against your life, and this storm is—"

Zuko finally brought himself to cut her off. "There’s a plot against her life, too."

Ursa sighed, not bothering to hide the heaviness of her frustration. "I suspect she can take care of herself.”

“She could have been kidnapped, for all we know…” Though he chose not to draw attention to it, he didn’t miss how easily his mother tossed out that the Avatar could handle herself while being so quick to prevent his going after her, as if by contrast he was the one who couldn’t take care of himself.

His mother was done. Zuko could tell by the look on her face.

“If she has not returned as the storm rolls out I will send additional guards to look for her.”

He snapped his mouth closed.

It was in moments like this where he could understand why it was that Azula and their mother were so prone to fighting.

Zuko, unlike Azula, had never had much in the way of confrontations with his mother, their relationship being far different. Azula was abrasive, and it seemed always to be her desire to get a rise out of someone for her own amusement. Both her and their mother were controlling and capable of being particularly vicious, and his mother in particular had a curtness about her that made Zuko grit his teeth. It was a side of the woman he seldom saw.

He begrudgingly returned to the summary of the council proceedings, having eagerly discarded the book earlier in his attempt to leave. Already he had thoughts about it, but those thoughts were still clouded by the distraction of everything going on, by the nagging anxiety about the future that seemed to cast its vicious shadow further and further with every passing day.

"You should visit your uncle.”

Zuko looked up, startled. At his mother’s words he closed the book perhaps a bit too quickly. He recalled, suddenly, what he had been attempting to discuss before the earlier interruption, but now the words seem to stick to his tongue. He had held off on visiting the Fire Lord, because actually seeing him and the state he was in would make it real. His mother had said there may be a chance, and yet she had said little else, and with his own eyes he could not say for sure whether her words held weight.

“I should,” he echoed, standing. He could not help himself but to glance at the window one more time.

“I will make sure you are the first to know when the Avatar turns up.” He met his mother’s eyes and she smiled softly, a stark contrast to the last few hours. “I am sure everything is alright.”

He nodded, discarding the book again.

“Take as much time as you need. I will send for you later this evening.”

* * *

  
  


The storm beckoned her.

It was easy enough for Toph to slip away; she had plenty of practice, and her attendant was already distracted flirting at the counter with the boy working there. 

Though it was the storm that called out to her, it was the roar of the ocean that filled every sense and drew her forward. The first drop of rain to land upon her urged her to move faster, until she was almost sprinting. She found the water easily, retracing the path she and the prince had taken just days before until she at last found herself upon the shore of the beach. 

That shore had been swallowed by the storm surge, as the tempest at last began to crash upon the bay. The rain had become a torrent and it drenched her clothes and weighed her down as she trudged ahead, undeterred. At the mouth of the beachfront had been a smattering of boulders, most of which now lay partially submerged. She made her way over to them, fighting the water and the wind, which whipped at her at her so hard at times it struck the breath from her.

Toph clambered up the largest of the boulders, manipulating the earth beneath her to ease her journey, which was made all the more difficult by the constant assault of the wind and the rain. Once atop the rock she raised her face to the sky and let the rain beat against her for a long while, listening to the thunder as it cracked. She could feel the heat and the static of the lightning that preceded it and the energy of it seemed to light a fire in her chest.

This storm had called to her, and she needed to know why. Carefully, she settled down cross legged on the top of the boulder, committed to enduring the storm.

Time passed, and Toph realized she had lost herself. The world still roared around her — the wind howled, the rain pounded, the air cackled —but she sat there unphased as it bore down on her. The fury of it soaked into her and she exhaled it back out, mirroring the breathing exercises she had been practicing with Zuko.

Hama was with her. Toph could not see her but she could feel her presence across from her, the woman’s energy cold and harsh and angry. She clouded the world around them with it, and Toph’s breaths became cold and frosty. They no longer caught in her throat in horror but instead left her calmly, the reality laid so bare now in front of her. Hama was with her, but Toph was not afraid.

The storm seemed to fade away until they both sat in a vacuum of silence and they were somewhere else entirely.

All of Toph’s life she had heard Avatar Hama heralded as one of the most powerful Avatars to ever live, yet the woman’s energy felt frail and withered. She could still remember the feeling of the woman’s clammy, wrinkled hands tearing at her body and she shuddered.

“You’re not what I expected.” There sat a woman who was frail and old beyond her years, a weathered soul in a shell of a person.

Toph could remember being a young girl and hearing her mother’s stories of the woman who had come to the town she called home and buried it beneath the sea. Her mother’s father had been the Governor of a sizable port city known for being sympathetic to the Fire Nation, and it had fallen victim to Hama’s anger.

There was a time when Toph was younger when her mother shared such things with her, but much of Toph’s knowledge of the city and its fate came from her tutors.

“Wrong!” Hama spat out suddenly, making Toph jump. “What happened to Luodai was the fault of the Fire Nation.”

“You sank it—”

“The Fire Nation lured me there."

Still— "A lot of people died.” There was probably not a single person in all of the Earth Kingdom who had not heard of the Sinking of Luodai. Yet there the perpetrator sat, eschewing the blame. “ _ You  _ did that.”

Hama let out a breath of what could have been a laugh. “Girl, do you have any idea how many people have died because of my actions?” The fate of the city meant nothing to her because it was just another casualty.

Toph toyed with a response, stilted and aggravated by the woman’s behavior. Eventually, though, Hama continued of her own accord. “I am not proud of Luodai,” she whispered, but it was difficult to say if it was regret that was carried in her voice. Toph grit her teeth, angry. “The Fire Nation sought to turn the Earth Kingdom against me, and it worked.”

“You never learned earthbending?” Toph ventured, coming to the obvious conclusion.

“I did, eventually. But that’s not why you are here, is it?”

“You never learned firebending.” It hung in the air on the fog of her breath, accusatory. It struck Toph like a revelation, her own struggle with firebending becoming startlingly clear.

“There is a deep unwillingness in our very soul to engage with fire, dear.”

The memories came back to her: again and again betrayed by fire, at the hands of friends and enemies alike. And the pain of it all came to her as well, seizing her with an agony as if lit ablaze. She screamed and her cries met the dry rattle of Hama’s laughter. The storm returned around them and Toph, for the briefest moment, slipped back into the world

She squeezed her eyes closed and blocked it out, focusing on her heart beat and falling into the patterns of breathing Zuko had taught her.

“No!” Toph shouted and at once everything stopped. Hama’s spirit, which had been flickering angrily like the dying wick of a candle, abruptly calmed, again matching the heartbeat of her own soul. “No, you broke the cycle.”

The ancient woman let out a sigh. “No, not me.  _ He  _ never learned firebending. He broke the cycle.”

“The airbender, Aang?” Toph asked as if Hama could be referring to anyone else.

“I understand General Iroh told you of him.”

Toph nodded, throat tight. “And you knew as well.”

Her soft laughter carried a mischievous grin. “I did. I mastered airbending, child.”

It shocked Toph to hear; she had had so little time to process the information given to her by the Fire Lord that she had not thought to extend that forbidden knowledge beyond what it meant for her. It had not occurred to her at all that Hama might have mastered an element that Toph, until just days prior, thought might never be mastered again.

Yet to know it lived on through Hama and her wretchedness soured it for her, and Toph curled her lips into a sharp frown.

“Your day will come,” Hama said.

“Not if you keep doing this.” Toph curled a fist over her chest, just above her diaphragm where the icy wedge Hama had driven into her was lodged. “ _ You’re  _ the reason I can’t make fire.”

“Maybe you should try harder,” Hama insisted.

It took almost everything Toph had to keep herself still and calm. She knew at once that Hama was trying to agitate her, and she had to hold herself steady to keep from rising to the bait.

And then Hama laughed.

Toph stood, abandoning her pose. The world around her seemed to warble briefly, the sound of the storm spilling in. But the veil of the spirit world held fast.

“Maybe,” she began, “If you had learned all of the elements you wouldn’t have fallen to the Fire Nation. Maybe you could have actually made a difference.”

It struck her the way Toph wanted it to, and Hama climbed to her feet as well, stepping closer to her. “I made a difference, girl!” Her voice, loud and angry, echoed out into the void around them. “I killed over ten thousand of the Fire Nation’s soldiers. I burned their colonies. I sank their ships!”

The cold returned, swallowing her senses: her breath was cold, her nose filled only with the burn of the crisp air; her skin hurt as the air snatched the warmth from her; her hair, damp and loose about her face, became frozen tendrils that clung to her skin.

Hama grabbed her, icy hands closing around her neck once more. Toph caught her wrists with her own stronger hands, but she did not tear them away and Hama made no move to harm her.

“Be me, for a while,” the woman whispered. “And then find your own fire.”

_ Her knees dug hard into icy earth. _

“Let me be the last Avatar to die at the hands of the Fire Nation.”

General Iroh stood above her, his boots crunching hard as his posture changed and his heels settled. He could strike her down at any time, and any hesitation was a moment to her advantage. She faced him defiantly and did nothing.

Her soul was exhausted.

“Promise me,” Hama cried out, finally lurching forward. He stepped aside with ease, and she crumpled onto the ice. It bled through her furs, much of which now had been scorched. She pushed herself upright, digging her sharp hands into the earth, which sank readily at her beck. She cracked the frozen tundra and the world rumbled fiercely. She didn’t follow through.

Their battle had left her with nothing.

Her strength waned.

Her soul was exhausted.

Iroh had stopped paying attention to her and had cast his gaze upwards to the waxing moon. The sky was a long expanse of threatening clouds, parting only for the glare of the moon, and the air hummed with the static of a coming storm. They were so near to the pole that the world seemed to almost blur out of existence around them, the tundra spilling out forever until it became lost in the sea of the snow and the ice. The wind began to whip harder, and with it blew frost which clung to her face and her lashes and tore angrily at her hair. She did not shiver: the cold was her element, and though it gave her strength she found herself unable to draw on it.

Her soul was exhausted and she was so tired.

Iroh had finally approached again, and this time the sound of his boots was lost in the growing scream of the world around them. Hama again found her knees against hard earth, and this time she sagged back against her heels.

“It is time,” General Iroh said, his voice gruff but still audible, as close as he now was. “You have to die, Hama.”

“I know!” she screamed. The wind caught her words and echoed them back to her, carrying with them another voice. A hand caught her shoulder and she did not look because she knew that no one would be there.  _ It is time _ fell gently upon her ears, the hand of the spirit of the Airbender upon her, whose secret she kept, whose name she had never once spoken lest his existence escape out into the world. His soul thrummed against her, washing over her with a calm she had not known since she was a young girl, unmarked by war and fire.

Finally, General Iroh had begun to move, slow and careful, as if beginning a dance, and it was a dance Hama recognized.

“Promise me,” she managed to croak out once more, and he paused to allow her time to speak. He had come to the Southern Water Tribe with his army, leading a final charge with the sole aim of seeking her out and killing her, and Hama had been quick to escape out into the tundra, heading to the pole. At the time she had not truly known whether she escaped to save her own life or to draw them away from the village, her humanity now fractured and uncertain, her desire at the time nothing more than to cling to her terrible existence.

But the cold silence of night had finally fallen, and the moon had waned and betrayed her and even the power of the pole begged her,  _ It is time. _ The airbender had no voice, and the words that were carried seemed to form in her mind in a thousand tongues, echoed to her through every voice of every Avatar. The Airbender with his gentle touch squeezed her shoulder in support and the violent whip of the wind seemed to settle immensely, whirling around her almost in an embrace.

“Promise me,” tears poured from her eyes, “Promise me I will be the last Avatar your people kill.” It was no longer her voice that spoke the words but instead it was her very soul. Iroh stood still, but his once steady hand had fallen into a tremor. Never in her life had she begged, not even at the hands of her tormentors during her years as a prisoner of the Fire Nation.

Iroh was quiet for a long time, the wind having settled and the sleet having died down as well. The world stood still. Finally, he whispered, “I will do everything in my power,” and his words were heavy and binding and she reached up for him. He clasped her withered hands in his own. She was not old, scarcely older than him, yet the horror she had wrought upon the world had snatched her youth from her too soon and had worn her down to a hollow husk now kept alive only by sheer stubborn refusal to die.

It was time.

Hama wept, clinging to Iroh’s stronger hands. He knelt down to come to her level, the acceptance of her defeat clear. Tears came to him as well but he did not weep openly as she did, merely squeezing her hands. “I promise,” he whispered to her and where their hands met their spirits briefly touched, the power of the words etching forever into their souls.

Hama, at last, nodded, and Iroh released her, stepping back once more, putting distance between them. The wind came to life again, whistling with the movements of his dance as he drew in energy.

“I will see you again,” she swore, and he looked down upon her one last time, the song on the wind became sharp and loud, lightning now dancing across his body. She laughed as he struck her down, electricity shooting through her, making her body twitch violently. She collapsed against the frozen earth, dying eyes fixed on the sky above, which began to dwindle. The wind died abruptly and the clouds faded away. The world did not weep for her.

(Iroh would wrap her body in her discarded cloak and carry her back to her village, where his soldiers had corralled the citizens into their homes, leaving them unharmed at his command. Her people would weep and he would pass her body off to them and they would mourn.

The woman of the village would clean her body and tame her long, wild hair, braiding it into thin ropes that they decorated with colorful beads made of shell and bone. They would paint her face with thick pigments of indigo and ash as they did warriors lain to rest, and then they would wrap her tightly in the hide of a polar bear dog and carry her out into the tundra to the spot of her death to be covered in shells and lain at last to rest.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm so excited to finally get to share more on Hama. Her death was a scene I wrote early on, and I've been eager to reveal it.
> 
> Going forward, expect the next update sometime mid March. We are approaching the conclusion of the first 'arc' of the story, which I expect will be two more chapters, followed by an interlude/flashback chapter.
> 
> As always, I appreciate the support and comments. I love responding to them and hearing everyone's theories of what's going to happen next. I hope so far it is living up to expectations. We have a long ways to go yet.


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